UN can cope with world problems
UN can cope with world problems
JAKARTA (JP): United Nations Secretary General Boutros Boutros-Ghali denied yesterday that the organization needs to be radically restructured, saying it is fully capable of coping with the world's current problems.
Boutros-Ghali told the forum of foreign affairs yesterday that he believed the UN has the capabilities to deal with the problems of the post Cold War era.
Responding to questions posed by Indonesian senior diplomats, including Hasnan Habib, the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) ambassador to Latin America and the Caribbean, Boutros-Ghali asserted that what's needed by the international body is the political will of member states.
Boutros-Ghali, who arrived with his wife Maria Leia on Friday for a five-day visit, said that the main problem with the effectiveness of the UN was that member states could not agree on how to use the organization to solve international problems.
A growing number of developing countries, including Indonesia, have called for reforms to the UN, to make it more effective and more attuned to the world's problems, which have changed vastly in the 50 years since the organization was set up.
Included in the reforms called for was the restructuring of the UN Security Council, expanding its permanent membership from the current five.
Boutros-Ghali said that the UN was already undergoing administrative reforms, including a reduction in the number of its international civil servants, as well as its budget.
"We are making the reforms, but at the same time, we're receiving increasing demands from member countries," he said, adding that 46 countries, for instance, have asked the United Nations for assistance during their elections.
He said such demands included calls for technical assistance, human rights protection, help in the process of democratization and intervention in peace keeping operations.
He said that one of the main problems facing the UN was finding donor countries. "It is getting more and more difficult to find a donor country," the secretary-general said, adding that he sometimes has to act as a "super-beggar".
On Monday, Boutros-Ghali will attend celebrations to mark the 40th anniversary of the Asia-Africa Conference -- which led to the foundation of the NAM -- in Bandung tomorrow, 180 kilometers southeast of Jakarta.
Indonesia is the first stop on Boutros-Ghali's lengthy tour to several countries, which also includes Australia, New Zealand, Fiji, France and Russia.
In his speech, Boutros-Ghali discussed the four cornerstones of the Charter of the United Nations -- peace, human rights, international law and development.
He called Indonesia a "leading contributor to the important debate aimed at strengthening the global consensus" on human rights.
He pointed out that recent years have seen the emergence of a new recognition of "the need to protect the rights of individual civilians caught in areas of conflict."
"In the past, civilian populations were largely the indirect victims of warfare," he said. "Today, they are often the main targets of conflict -- many of which now take place within, rather than between, states".
He praised Indonesia's impressive success in achieving development, while reducing poverty. "As the international community struggles with the challenge of global development, Indonesia's experience provide ideas, examples and lessons," he said.
Following his discussion of the struggle of the international community in strengthening the four cornerstones, Boutros-Ghali pointed out that progress is possible.
"The problems I have covered make it clear that cooperation is crucial," he said. "Only the United Nations can provide the forums and the instruments that are needed for progress." (swe)