I honestly don’t know how it works in other countries, but
here in Italy for each apartment block there’s an administrator who organizes general meetings
and manages all the paperwork. All right, now, imagine a condominium.
A big condominium, with 1 hundred and ninty three 193 families that, every year, as in all condos,
gather in an assembly. They discuss and approve budgets, vote for their chairmen, argue
and complain to each other about their neighbors. But this Assembly has some peculiarities: in fact,
every decision, report, recommendation approved here is in no way binding.
Even if you convince the entire building that your neighbor, Mr. city of Pistoia, has taken too many
liberties in the use of common spaces, nothing can stop him from carrying on as he pleases.
Only community decisions regarding formal and bureaucratic matters,
expenses and budgets have any validity. After all, that's what counts: money is
no joke, and you know how it goes: no one rejoices at the idea of being
administrator and president of an apartment block. Add another element: in addition to this Assembly,
there is another, more restricted and binding one: a Council, whose authority, with all due
respect to Mr. Pistoia, is not in question. There are ten families established by the
Assembly, which alternate for the next two years. But to these another five families are added,
and these always have their place in the Council. They will say that they built the
building and therefore...well they own it. These are very special guys and, in fact,
these 5 do not even trust each other: they have studied a mechanism according to which
if even one of them is against a resolution, the resolution itself can be blocked.
This means that if one of them, let's say Mr. Vladimir, decides to park his new flaming car in
front of the garage of another of his colleague, Mr. Volodymyr, this Council cannot do anything
because any decision would require the favorable vote of Mr. Vladimir himself.
Now, replace "condominium" with UN, family units with "states", Mr. Pistoia with any forgotten
country [add Stan Countries] and awesome car with Russian tank and we are already well on our way.
As for Mr. Vladimir and Mr. Volodymyr, there is no need to change anything.
We need it to get straight to the question of the day: what's wrong with the UN? On the
one hand we have become accustomed to the idea that the decisions that count
are always taken by the usual 5, the so-called permanent members of the UN: USA, Russia, France,
UK and the People's Republic of China. This is the exclusive group, the private
party that can always get away with it. There are proposals for a Security Council
more representative of the world population, or suggestions to extend the permanent seat
to Brazil, India and Germany, or even to turn the French seat into a larger EU seat.
But for the moment we have to make do with the compromise of the non-permanent members,
provided that your country is lucky enough to end up there at the right time. This does not
undermine the fact that there is a considerable gap between the competences of the Assembly
and those of the Council, the only body that can deliberate sanctions, embargoes and even
military actions against possible aggressors. It is true, however, that according to Article
27 of the UN Charter, two different majorities are established each time
depending on the two types of issues to be submitted to the vote of the council.
There are procedural matters, i.e. the formal ones that establish the course of the session,
which require the favorable vote of at least 9 members, both permanent and non-permanent.
And then there are the decisions "on any other matter" which always require a majority of nine
votes, including those of the 5 permanent members. In a certain respect, article 27 recognizes the
superiority of some states over all the others. And here we already have a first jarring note:
it is up to the Council alone, or rather to the 5 permanents, to establish what is a threat to
peace, an aggression or an act of conquest. In some cases there is not much to discuss,
such as the invasion of Kuwait in 1991 by Saddam's Iraq: on that occasion resolutions
were issued calling for the withdrawal of Iraqi troops, imposing sanctions and finally,
with resolution 678, authorizing the use of force to impose Iraqi withdrawal.
But it doesn't always work smoothly, see what happened in Bosnia and Somalia. In a sense,
rather than banning wars, the Security Council is the only body that can recognize a state's right
to wage wars. Things would become much more complicated if the bad guy was one of the 5
permanent members, and here we have the second and main problem: the so-called
vetoes. Actually the power of veto is not explicitly mentioned in the UN Charter,
and it is not a veto in a strict sense. According to the already mentioned article 27, for all
the issues that are not procedural, therefore issues related to peace, conflict resolution,
sanctions and even the entry of countries in the UN, the nine minimum votes in favor must
include the approval of all 5 permanent members, and therefore the contrary vote of one of them
implicitly becomes a kind of veto. In reality, the negative opinion of one of the 5 cannot block
the deliberation from the beginning, as a pure veto right would allow, but it can only make it
void during the voting phase. Similarly, it must be said, even the non-permanent members enjoy,
in theory, a similar power, the so-called block veto. Even if all 5 vote in favor,
there would still be 4 votes missing to reach a majority of 9. If the non-permanent members
would unite to vote against, well the party’s compromised. For convenience, as everyone does,
I will call this prerogative by the term veto, even though it would be a misnomer for some
lawyers. We would then have the paradox of an aggressor country sitting comfortably on its
seat in the Council that finds itself having to vote on the resolution condemning its own actions:
In your opinion, will this nation block itself with its veto, or will it play dumb and forget
to vote against it? The answer is pretty clear. Yet, such rebel nation must still participate in
the discussion. At least to get the scolding from the other four. This game of "veto not veto" has
already been cleared and abused in the 70s by the UN members, so nothing shocking. It was the
Soviet Union that got into it right away. However, Stalin, in his "infinite" wisdom,
decided to boycott the sessions of the Council when its members continued to recognize
Taiwan rather than Mao's China. In the meantime, in 1950, North Korea had invaded South Korea
and the Security Council, in a hurry and taking advantage of the Soviet absence, approved
resolutions on which the Soviet Union would certainly have vetoed. From that moment on, the
Soviet Union did not skip any sessions, and put its veto on everything possible. But don't worry,
the other 4 didn’t stand by and watch. United Kingdom and France used the right of veto for the
first time in 1956, during the Suez crisis that saw them involved, together with Israel, in the
military occupation of the canal against Egypt. Then in the 70's it was the turn of the United
States, which exercised its right of veto mainly in defense of Israel from the risk of sanctions.
The USSR loved the use of the veto so much that Ambassador Andrei Gromyko earned the nickname of
Mr. Nyet (Mr. No), while Vyacheslav Molotov that of Mr. Veto. We did the math: the veto right has
been exercised two hundred and sixty three times, sometimes by several members together, for 213
rejected resolutions. Russia/Urss for 120 times, then United States at 82, United Kingdom 29,
France 16, and China 16. The veto right has often been used as a kind of protection for
one's own interests, something that has little to do with achieving peace and harmony. And
here we can open the cauldron of contradictions. The UN is supposed to be an equal organization,
yet 5 countries can block everything. And okay, those 5 are the winners of WWII, but can France
and UK still be considered great powers as in the Eighteenth century? It was Roosevelt at the
time who named 4 policemen to ensure peace in the world; the three war winners plus the Republic of
China, despite the fact that the latter was in a political crisis, according to a concept that
was actually very close to the classic divisions by "spheres of influence". And let's take into
account that dozens and dozens of vetoes have been used not to prevent international crises, but to
hinder the appointment of Secretaries General, or worse, to prevent the entry of some states
into the UN. Like children in primary school. The People's Republic of China replaced the Taiwanese
in 1971 and immediately resorted to vetoes to prevent the entry of Bangladesh and other
countries that were still recognizing Taiwan. We Italians managed to enter the United Nations only
in 1955, due to vetoes placed by the Soviet Union. This management system thus seems to grant the 5
powerful permanent members that no decision they do not like will ever be effective. The veto power
somehow implies that nothing can be done without the total willingness of the big 5. Basically
The world cannot be at peace if they 5 are not at peace. The underlying assumption of the veto
mechanism thus seems to be that world order is not possible if the big 5 do not agree all together.
As if to say: if sanctions on Lukashenko may upset one of us (who knows who -- PUTIN), with
the risk of creating tensions between us, then better not to sanction him at all.
Rather than a real blockade, some see the veto as a sort of prevention, a collective mechanism:
it is a way to ensure that a conflict does not break out among the 5 permanent members,
which apparently, would be the most important thing for our global stability.
There are also those who argue that the absence of the veto would create more instability,
and so it would be right to keep such veto. Vetoes proved their validity only in cases that were of
narrow interest to the Council itself and most of the times vetoes weren’t used to
meet humanitarian demands or to put an end to international conflicts. And so Russia vetoed
the resolution to open an investigation into the Malaysian Airlines accident in Donbass,
as well as the condemnation for the annexation of Crimea. Russia also vetoed, together with China,
the resolutions against the Assad regime in Syria in 2011 and 2012. Just as on the other
side of the table, the U.S. vetoed the recognition of the genocide in Rwanda. In addition to this,
many says that the continued US vetoes against sanctions targeting Israel are contributing to
exacerbate relations with the Palestinians. Mentioning Syria, aside from Russia and Iran,
the big allies who have supported its bombings and attacks, the United States, Saudi Arabia,
EAU and Turkey have also been part of the clashes. And just as Russia has violated the UN Charte,
bombing the Aleppo region and hundreds of civilian targets, as well as approving the use of chemical
weapons by the Assad regime, the United States of Obama and Trump did the same thing:
By launching more than fifty Tomahawk cruise missiles on Syria, the Americans bypassed the
constraints of the UN Charter that limit the use of force in international affairs.
And in the end, the UN Security Council still could not agree on a joint statement on Syria.
Russia, has repeatedly blocked negotiations moved by the other three Western nations. For their own
part, the United Kingdom, France and the United States have done the same with Russian demands,
calling them excessive and unacceptable. And so the endless game continues. So it’s pretty normal
to expected that a Council structured in this way is going to be unable to take action in conflicts
of global dimensions, right because such conflicts may involve a permanent member. For days the
UN members have been discussing a possible suspension or expulsion of Russia from the
UN and the Security Council, in order to bypass its veto in the resolutions concerning Ukraine.
Apart from the fact that the possible veto of China would still
remain, is it really possible to exclude Russia? A first step has already been taken in this sense,
with the suspension of Moscow from the UN Human Rights Council at least until 2023,
an action made possible by the decision of the General Assembly alone.
Only Libya suffered a similar fate in 2011, but here with Russia we are
dealing with a member of the Council. Beyond its symbolic significance,
this measure denies Russia the possibility to propose resolutions and amendments in
situations in which it is not directly involved. Suspending Russia from the UN and therefore
from the Security Council, however, is more complicated and according to many analists
actually impossible. According to article 5, the Assembly could decide, with two thirds of
votes in favor, the suspension of a UN country, but only towards those countries towards which
the Security Council has initiated proceedings. In other words, it is necessary to ask Russia
first if it is okay to be suspended. The very borderline hypothesis of denying the Russian
delegation the credentials to represent its country, from documentation to the
recognition of its delegates, was then discussed. This is a procedure that is normally implemented
for those countries where a coup d'état or civil war undermines the legitimacy of the government
and consequently of the UN delegation. This happened recently in the cases of Afghanistan,
Myanmar and Cambodia in 1997. however Russia does not have a similar situation,
but it is clear that the intervention in Ukraine, according to the UN chart (which by the way no one
seems to respect anymore), is a clear violation of international law. But according to some,
it would be possible to exclude Russia even though it does not have a coup d'état or a civil war:
the same thing had already been done with regard to South Africa, in 1974. At first, the Security
Council rejected a resolution to suspend the African country, requested as a measure in
response to the apartheid regime. Vetoed by the United States, France and the United Kingdom, in
case you were wondering. Nevertheless, the General Assembly symbolically refused to approve the South
African credentials, to the point of deciding to no longer admit the south african delegation to
the Assembly, at least until 1994 with the end of apartheid. And here we should stress the sentence
"dont' try this at home". Maybe the safest way to solve the UN dilemma is for the suspension
to mature within the Council itself, which is obviously impossible at the moment. Finally
the question we can't help but ask ourselves is who knows what a Chavez would have done,
with his little guitar... Or Gaddafi with his uninterrupted monologue of an hour and a half...
perhaps to find a way out of this quagmire it takes just the right amount of madness.