It was on 10 December 1948 that the UN General Assembly adopted, after lengthy negotiations, in which the American then-First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt was a leading figure, a remarkable document on basic human rights — the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The drafting of this document, in the immediate aftermath of World War II, [...]
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Filed under: Human Rights, UN History, United Nations
Brian Urquhart - British former Under-Secretary General at the UN for ages, who came “on board” the Organization even before its actual founding - is still writing and thinking about his memorable experiences there.
Not everybody who works at the UN gets to have as much fun as Urquhart did. You can count on [...]
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Filed under: Iraq, UN History
The NY Times has an article on a colleague (we have not yet had the pleasure of making his acquaintance), who blogs from UNHQ/NY. The Story, As Blogs Proliferate, a Gadfly With Accreditation at the U.N., by Maria Aspan, was published on 30 April, and focuses mainly on issues concerning accreditation [with which we [...]
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Filed under: Blogging, Journalism and Journalists, UN History
An interesting read can be found at the Nation magazine’s 2 April 2007 issue, in an article entitled “Made in USA“, which at least starts off as a rather scathing review of two of what the author, Perry Anderson, calls “fawning” biographies of Kofi Annan:
“The facts of Annan’s career are clear enough, and in [...]
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Filed under: Iraq, Kofi Annan, UN History, UN Peacekeeping, UN Secretary-General
He used to grin and chuckle when called the future President, all those years when he was working in exile to bring independence to his people. At times, it seemed East Timor was a hopeless case, and he was working for a lost cause — all those years that he paced the corridors of [...]
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Filed under: East Timor, Journalism and Journalists, UN History
Here is a very wierd story, published in the Washington Post today. Are we to believe that this man and his likes were the ones who set up the UN Oil-For-Food program? And then the skimmed off the top?
“South Korean businessman and influence peddler Tongsun Park was sentenced Thursday to five years in [...]
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Filed under: Corruption, Iraq, UN History, UN Secretary-General
The Associated Press (AP) is not sleeping. UN Correspondent Edith Lederer writes in a piece published this morning that Ban Ki-moon takes the reins of U.N.: “UNITED NATIONS - South Korean diplomat Ban Ki-moon became the United Nations’ eighth secretary-general on New Year’s Day as the organization faced a tough array of global issues — [...]
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Filed under: BAN Ki-Moon, North Korea, Transition, UN General Assembly, UN History, UN Secretary-General
The Associated Press (AP) is reporting today from Iraq that hundreds are flocking to see Saddam’s gravesite near his hometown of Tikrit. One AP story has this: “Mohammed Natiq, a 24-year-old college student, said ‘the path of Arab nationalism must inevitably be paved with blood…God has decided that Saddam Hussein should have such an end, [...]
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Filed under: Iraq, Israel, Middle East Peace Process, Palestine & Palestinians, UN General Assembly, UN History
The SG-desginate, BAN KI-MOON of South Korea, will be sworn in as the next UNSG at the UN General Assembly in New York at 10 a.m. on 14 December. But Kofi Annan’s mandate does not end until 31 December at midnight, New York Time.
Musing on BAN KI-MOON’s post-election statements in New York, my Mentor wrote to [...]
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Filed under: Blogging, Transition, UN History