Indonesia should put UN back in line, analyst says
Moch. N. Kurniawan, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
Indonesia and other Asian countries should make use of their resources to ensure world issues are decided by the United Nations, not military might, analyst says.
Karl Kaiser, director of the Research Institute of the German Society for Foreign Affairs, said Asian countries could make the UN more relevant in the coming years.
"This can only be done if all parts of the world and of course Asia, where most people in the world live, play an active role.
"And Indonesian diplomacy can make a considerable contribution towards it," he said.
Kaiser was speaking to reporters after a discussion on the new world order after the Iraq war, organized by the Centre for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS).
He said the world would like to see reforms taking place within the UN, but even without the reforms, the world body, especially its Security Council, could be used to prevent unilateralism in resolving problems.
"I must admit that there could be special circumstances involving imminent danger that is impossible to get a quick resolution, like the use of weapons of mass destruction," he said.
"But as a rule, like with Iraq, when we have plenty of time and no imminent danger, we should explore all possibilities within the UN system," he said, apparently alluding to the United States's unilateral attack and invasion of Iraq.
He expressed hope that the United States would get back on track to help build a strong UN.
Kaiser claimed that the U.S. population had supported the presence of a strong UN.
Early this year, the U.S. and its allies declared war on Iraq without a mandate from the UN, claiming the attack was necessary to liberate Iraqi people from a cruel regime and destroy weapons of mass destruction.
They claimed they believed that Iraq was able to launch weapons of mass destruction in just 45 minutes. No such weapons have been found.
Kaiser said the Iraq war was a sign that the U.S. military, which was far superior to any other force, had its own justification to start a war.
"In the Iraq case, there should be a new mandate from the UN to establish a peace keeping mission there," he said.
"In the future, we should return to the UN system so that unilateralism can be stopped."
He said the U.S. role in the new world order would be still dominant, but the dominance would only exist in the military field.
"We must live with that. However, the U.S. will also depend on other countries in dealing with terrorism ...," he said.
For example, in the world fight against terrorism, 90 percent of the efforts involved cooperation among police, intelligence and then bureaucracy instead of the military, Kaiser said.
Kaiser also said that European and Asian countries would have more power than they were aware of in the increasingly interdependent world.