Ambassador Susan Rice, the U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, gave the first of a series of scheduled speeches last week in Portland, Oregon. The focus of the speeches is “Why America Needs the UN” and was inspired, apparently, by congressional efforts to include U.S. payments to the U.N. among …
Last week, the House of Representatives’ Committee on Foreign Affairs held a hearing titled “The United Nations: Urgent Problems that Need Congressional Action.” At that hearing, Chairman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R–FL) made a statement: Ambassador Susan Rice says that the U.S. approach to the U.N. is, “We pay our bills. We …
The Norwegian Nobel Committee held its annual awards ceremony last week in Oslo, where it intended to award the 2010 Nobel Peace Prize to Chinese intellectual and human rights activist Liu Xiaobo “for his long and non-violent struggle for fundamental human rights in China.” Still imprisoned, Liu was prevented from …
Although Iran and North Korea have received far more attention, Syria is belatedly becoming a prime focus of international concern over nuclear proliferation. On December 1, the Institute for Science and International Security released satellite photos of suspected Syrian nuclear sites linked to the covert Al-Kibar nuclear reactor that Israeli …
Last year at this time, the United Nations was coming to grips with the fact that the Copenhagen climate change summit would not produce a legally binding climate pact to succeed the failed Kyoto Protocol. In retrospect, nearly everyone acknowledges that the Copenhagen conference failed utterly to achieve its objectives. …
International climate change talks kick off yesterday in Cancun, Mexico, and the expectations aren’t nearly as high as they were last year at the summit in Copenhagen, where no country committed to any legal binding agreement. This year in Cancun, leaders from nearly 200 countries will come together at the …
Typically the largest wealth distribution program that occurs in Cancun, Mexico, is college students spending their parents’ money. That could change at the upcoming United Nations climate summit if developing countries clamoring for money to cope with global warming get their wish. With each passing year, it’s clear that international …
Missing in news reports on the recent release of the United Nations 2010 Human Development Report is any mention of a significant addition to the report. For the first time, the HDR includes the Multidimensional Poverty Index, which measures poverty based on components other than income and GDP. The Index …
If the standoff over continued Israeli settlements in the West Bank continues, the Palestinian Authority has threatened to abandon negotiations with Israel and appeal to the United Nations to recognize a Palestinian State within the territory that Israel occupied in the 1967 Arab-Israeli war. Such a unilateral move by the …
President Barack Obama made waves during his trip to India by telling the Indian parliament that “in the years ahead, I look forward to a reformed United Nations Security Council that includes India as a permanent member.” This simple, vague statement has become the headline for his entire visit with …
