By John Stremlau
June 17, 1999
John Stremlau is professor of international relations at the
University of the Witwatersrand.
United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan persuaded the 15 UN Security Council representatives to leave work early on June 4 for a weekend retreat on "ways to invigorate their role in dealing with international peace security".
Never before has the council met in an informal setting. Annan has long lobbied for such a meeting, but was repeatedly rebuffed. Until Kosovo. With the UN on the sidelines in the biggest crisis since the Gulf War, the UN reform movement may be gaining steam. Annan knows better than anyone what is needed, but only a handful of UN activist countries (including SA) appear ready to embrace his three-dimensional vision for UN reform.
First, Annan will try to use next year's Millennium Assembly to shift the focus of the UN from an overriding concern with the security of states towards ensuring the security of people within them. His aim is not to undermine interstate order, but to prevent its subversion by a proliferation of sectarian conflicts that spew forth refugees, destroy the infrastructure for development, and divert resources from more productive purposes.
For the UN to help prevent, resolve and reconcile conflict will require a greater willingness to declare extreme human rights abuses a threat to international peace, as it did in the case of apartheid.
Consensus about the dangers of internal aggression against particular groups elsewhere has been lacking; much less what to do about even the most extreme abuses: genocide in Rwanda and "ethnic cleansing" in the Balkans. Annan will do what he can to put human security on the Millennium agenda, presumably with SA's support.
Second, the UN Security Council, designed to help prevent a third world war, is dysfunctional in preventing and resolving most conflicts. Reducing the entrenched privileges of the US, UK, France, Russia and China, while diversifying the membership to be more representative of a UN which has grown from 45 to 185 countries, may not result in a UN that is more responsive to problems of human security. Without it, however, the UN will continue to lose credibility.
SA, as chair of the Non-Aligned Movement, could take the lead in identifying a formula likely to garner the broadest support.
Former US ambassador to SA Princeton Lyman suggests a sound starting point for Security Council reform. To be effective, Lyman argues that the council needs the legitimacy of countries with the most people plus authority from the rich and powerful. He proposes adding at least nine permanent seats. Three would go to the UN's big contributors: Japan and Germany, with another alternating between Italy and Canada. Africa, Asia and Latin America would each fill two by regional consensus that should favour the biggest countries.
The 10 nonpermanent members would continue to be elected from among the majority of smaller states. The council would then represent at least 75% of the world's gross national product and a majority of its people.
The US will continue to oppose any increase beyond six as "unwieldy". All five permanent members will refuse to relinquish their veto or extend it to others. The US might yield on expansion, assuming regional powers will bicker endlessly over who gets which seat.
If Africans could agree quickly on a formula, this might spur other regions to overcome local rivalries. SA might lead the way by offering to share a seat with Nigeria and Egypt, with the second rotating among the 50 smaller Organisation for African Unity members.
The vast UN majority opposed to the veto should press the five permanent members to accept broad, well-defined, voluntary restraints on its future use.
Annan's third objective is to put the UN on a sounder financial footing. Three countries (the US, Japan and Germany) are responsible for 53% of the UN's budget, while the US is $1,3bn in arrears. The rich should pay more, but the total contribution of the 128 developing countries amounts to less than 8%, with Russia and China each paying less than 2% and India 0,31%. Lyman rightly argues that each new permanent member should cover at least 3% of general costs, plus a premium for peacekeeping. This would help end US congressional interference in UN operations.
Although SA is not on the council, for the next three years it has the advantage of chairing the Non-Aligned Movement and a UN secretary general with whom Pretoria can work closely in the run-up to the Millennium Assembly. In the meantime, the quest for finding a workable formula to expand and reform the council must accelerate through the hard work of multilateral diplomacy, at which SA excels.
Annan deserves encouragement. SA and other countries that support his vision should also act now to help strengthen his office. Three years ago Norway created a Fund for Preventive Action to give the secretary general the capacity and flexibility to respond to signs of trouble and to deal more effectively with the Security Council.
Though SA's foreign affairs budget is strapped, Pretoria should consider a one-off voluntary contribution of several million rands to Annan's fund. This would not only bolster the secretary general; it would also remind the international community that reform of the UN will require active support and financial sacrifice of all its members.
