|
At UN, Outgoing Khalilzad Quieter on Congo and Reform, the
Price of Being Well-Liked?
Byline: Matthew Russell Lee of
Inner City Press at the UN: News Analysis
UNITED NATIONS,
January 12 -- With Barack Obama set
to take control in eight days, it's the time it seems for revisionist
assessments of Zalmay Khalilzad, the outgoing Bush administration's
U.S.
Ambassador to the UN. Khalilzad is certainly better liked within the UN
than
his predecessor John Bolton. Liberal and moderates even sense that he
is one of
them. Some of this is due, however, to disinterest. Khalilzad's
interests were
Afghanistan and Iraq, to some degree the Middle East -- Africa much
less so,
and UN reform surprisingly little.
Maybe
accomplishments on the first two
issues had to be bought by backing off on reform. Khalilzad rarely
mentions the
UN's largest peacekeeping mission, and the largest global war since the
one
resulting in the UN: the Democratic Republic of the Congo. One assumes
that
this prioritization will change under Obama and the Ambassador he has
nominated, Susan Rice.
In perhaps
another sign of disinterest or priorities
being elsewhere, there is Somalia, a peacekeeping for which Condoleezza
Rice had
projected before the end of 2008. While a
resolution is slated to be adopted before January 20, as
Inner City Press
exclusively reported at New Years, it will be a largely UK-drafted
proposal,
different than which Condi Rice had said.
Under
Khalilzad unlike Bolton, the US Mission became unwilling to comment
other than
"on background" about UN reform.
Zalmay Khalilzad sings swan song, UN
reforms and Congo not shown
There are claims
of accomplishing a
UN-wide Ethics Program and Whistleblower Protection, as well as public
access
to information and financial disclosure, at UN Fund and Program like
the UN
Development Program, but Secretary-General Ban
Ki-moon accepted outgoing UNDP
Administrator Kemal Dervis' assertion that the UN Ethics Office had no
jurisdiction over UNDP or its firing of a whistleblowing employee.
While UNDP's
Administrator answers to his own Executive Board, now
Ban -- and the U.S., to be realistic -- will be naming Dervis'
replacement. Why
not make accepting the jurisdiction of the UN Ethics Office a condition
for
being selected?
In one comment that Team Khalilzad allowed to
be "on the record," Inner City Press asked Khalilzad if American Lynn
Pascoe will be staying as the head of the UN Department of Political
Affairs.
Khalilzad said he has no reason to believe that he will not.
A senior UN
official, asked Monday afternoon by Inner City Press about Khalilzad's
general
non-mention of the Congo, noted that his wife Cheryl Benard is very
interested
in the Congo, particularly the issue of sexual violence there. So
perhaps there
is a divison of labor in the family. They are
nice people. Certainly they had their achievements. Why not then be
on the record?
What
approach will Obama, Hillary Clinton and Susan Rice take? Watch this
site.
Click here for Inner City Press'
review-of-2008 UN Top Ten debate
Click here for Inner
City Press' December 24 debate on UN budget, Niger
Click here from Inner City Press'
December 12 debate on UN double standards
Click here for Inner
City Press' November 25 debate on Somalia, politics
Click here for Inner City
Press Nov. 7 debate on the war in Congo
Watch this site, and this Oct. 2 debate, on
UN, bailout, MDGs
and this October 17 debate, on
Security Council and Obama and the UN.
* * *
These
reports are
usually also available through Google
News and on Lexis-Nexis.
Click
here
for a Reuters
AlertNet piece by this correspondent
about Uganda's Lord's Resistance Army. Click
here
for an earlier Reuters AlertNet piece about the Somali
National
Reconciliation Congress, and the UN's $200,000 contribution from an
undefined trust fund. Video
Analysis here
Feedback: Editorial
[at] innercitypress.com
UN Office: S-453A, UN, NY 10017
USA
Tel: 212-963-1439
Reporter's mobile (and
weekends):
718-716-3540
Other,
earlier Inner City Press are listed here, and some are available
in the ProQuest service, and now on Lexis-Nexis.
Copyright
2006-08 Inner City Press, Inc. To request
reprint or other permission, e-contact Editorial [at]
innercitypress.com -
|
