Instead of freeing them from economic blackmail, it has laid them open to shameless manipulation. Rather than working towards the general uplift of the living standard of the deprived millions of this planet, the ‘system’ has become a millstone around their collective necks.
#LOOK OVER THE SHOULDER TOWARDS THE REAR FREE#
It needs to be counted among the failures of the United Nations that the international economic assistance regime, instead of assuming the role of healer of the economic ills of the poor, has been given free rein to degenerate into a re-incarnation of the money-lending system of medieval ages, with its built-in inequities. Here too the world body has failed “the peoples of the United Nations”. In order to ensure a peaceful World Order, the United Nations should also have striven to ensure a fair and equitable World Economic Regime.
In so doing, the International Organization has helped to nurture festering flashpoints the world over. Jammu and Kashmir issue is a case in point. Too often, regrettably, the United Nations has arranged for a ceasefire and then rested on its laurels. Cessation of hostilities should be viewed merely as a first step towards the ultimate goal of an equitable and durable settlement of the dispute. In other words, mere papering over of the cracks can hardly do the trick. On the subject of peacekeeping, one is also tempted to venture the remark that this process should also encompass the ‘establishment of durable peace’. The NATO authorities must surely have wondered sometime as to what made then enter into this rather murky situation. The United Nations provided the umbrella for the stationing of NATO forces in Afghanistan in an operation that, by no stretch of imagination, can be seen as a peacekeeping venture.Īnd all under the notional command of the United States Armed Forces. All Western-oriented Defense Organizations – and NATO in particular – were roped in to do America’s bidding. The events of nine/eleven turned every known paradigm on its head. This is not to say that the United Nations has exactly covered itself with glory in this particular field. After all, peacekeeping was, and should be, one of the principal concerns of the United Nations. The NATO operations and, subsequently, the EU Rapid Reaction Force gave rise to other question marks too.įor one thing, they put the United Nations’ role in peacekeeping into a gray area. In others they came into operation so late that the world was left wondering as to their efficacy.
In some instances they have failed miserably to prevent the worst. What did interest one, though, was what role, if any, might have been envisaged for the Force in international peacekeeping operations.īy hindsight, such operations have at best been a mixed blessing. It is a bit late to delve into the merits or demerits of the EU decision. On the other hand it was generally recognized at the time as to how long would the European Union be content to confine its foreign policy instruments to an America–dominated alliance.
The Americans were worried, and justifiably so, that the decision to set up the EU Rapid Reaction Force would pose a threat to NATO primacy in the field of collective defense. The European Union had been squirming for quite some time to acquire some freedom of maneuver for itself.Īfter some notable successes in the economic field, defense was but the logical next step. The end of the Cold War was bound to have repercussions of some sort. The decision went against the America’s long held assumption that they (USA that is) should have the decisive say in matters concerned with – among other things – the defense of Europe. Having officiated at the birth of NATO and being one of its recognized godfathers, the Americans too looked askance at this decision of the EU. When the European Union had taken the decision to set up the EU Rapid Reaction Force, it had raised several eyebrows among the International Affairs buffs. While the Warsaw Pact died a natural death, NATO was left in a wilderness of sorts. Then it came to pass that all of a sudden the Cold War came to an end. The era of the Cold War, when the Warsaw Pact and NATO arrogated unto themselves the powers that should best have been vested in the United Nations, is a case in point. What to talk of the United Nations (Nobel Peace Prize and all!), several piddling outfits have taken it upon themselves the task of the establishment of World Peace that the founding fathers had envisaged as the exclusive preserve of the United Nations Organization. Six decades and more down the road we are today left with the contemplation of whether or not the United Nations has actually lived up to the high ideals it was set up for. THE Charter of the United Nations begins with the words “We, the peoples of the United Nations…’.
The UN and its ideals - a look over the shoulder!