It is a total failure of the UN system which has been held to ransom by the US and US-led western countries.
by Anwar A. Khan
United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres appealed to Russian President Vladimir Putin to cease his invasion of Ukraine and withdraw his troops.
"The decisions of the coming days will shape our world and directly affect the lives of millions upon millions of people," Guterres told reporters at U.N. headquarters.
The use of force by one country against another violates the bedrock principles of the United Nations that all states have agreed to in its Charter, he said.
Guterres said the current military offensive is wrong. "It is against the (U.N.) Charter. It is unacceptable. But it is not irreversible," he said. "I repeat my appeal from last night to President Putin: Stop the military operation; bring the troops back to Russia."
It is a total failure of the UN system which has been held to ransom by the US and US-led western countries.
The Russian invasion of Ukraine and the negation of the Security Council resolution have given world-watchers an opportunity to assess the role of United Nations and its relevance today in maintaining order in the civilized world.
The UN Charter “mandates the UN and its member states to maintain international peace and security, uphold international law, achieve higher standards of living” for their citizens, address economic, social, health, and related problems”, and promote “universal respect for, and observance of, human rights and fundamental freedoms for all without distinction as to race, sex, language or religion”.
However, the world is not run by peace-making philosophers and philanthropies, but the political and military leaders. The United States President Franklin D. Roosevelt coined the word United States and since then US and its western allies have been virtually dictating terms for the functioning of UN and behaving as self-styled policemen of the world. The result was intense cold war between the US led NATO and Soviet Union and consequent rat race among opponent countries for missile and weapons and deployment of atomic weapons. The cold war ended with the break-up of Soviet Union.
If we analyse the current Russian invasion of the Ukraine, it becomes clear how this small country with good resources was used as a pawn by the America and its western allies. Ever since Ukraine became independent and showed a leaning towards the US and its European allies, Russian President Vladimir Putin, a former KGB officer, vowed to bring back the past glory of the Soviet era for the Russians.
After he came to power, his popularity soared from two percent to 45 percent following his role in annexing Chechnya-- which is now known as Chechen, a constituent republic of Russia. In 2014 Russia invaded the Crimean Peninsula and annexed it and on March 18, 2014 it became a constituent republic of Russia when President Vladimir Putin signed the accession. In retaliation the US and their European partners signed several agreements with Ukraine and goaded it to join the NATO. The US tried to encircle Russia and bring nuclear and weapon arsenals to Russian doors.
Russian President Putin warned the west and Ukraine not to join NATO and cited it as the violation of Minsk treaty of 2015 between Russia and Ukraine brokered by the French President.
Now let us examine the scenario. America and its partners have a history of bombing the world all over like they did in Iraq, Vietnam and Afghanistan, Libya, Iraq et al citing threat to international peace, but withdrawing without taking the affected countries and people into confidence.
America has bombed so far more than 30 countries and is responsible for blood baths and ruination of lives of millions of people. The way they withdrew and left behind their weapons in Afghanistan makes a mockery of the UN Charter. So far, the US has exercised the veto power more than 80 times. The Indian Government’s response to the American-backed resolution in the UN Security Council on February 26, 2022 had wide acceptance among the Indian people as Russia has been a time-tested friend and exercised veto power in the UN four times in favour of India during the crucial times and especially in 1948 and 1971.
Putin may be a dictator in the eyes of West by violating the UN Charter and he has been threatening the use of nuclear power if US and NATO come to the rescue of Ukraine. But in this war, he is paying back the Americans in the same style in which they have been bombing other countries piggybacking the UN system. It is a total failure of the UN system which has been held to ransom by the US led western countries. We see the West has two value systems, one for them and the other for other countries.
The ineffectual nature of the United Nations, which has no intrinsic military power of its own, and its incapacity to confront belligerent nations invading other nations, has been demonstrated again and again, and one critic took note, tweeting, “The United Nations died today (I personally think it was dead already but nothing left after tonight).”
Writing about the United Nations in National Review in 2017, Andrew McCarthy opined:
When you pretend that all states are equal, that there is no difference between the good guys and the bad guys, that is always a coup for the bad guys. And that’s what the U.N. is: a coup for the bad guys.
Article 1 of the United Nations Charter states: “The Purposes of the United Nations are: To maintain international peace and security, and to that end: to take effective collective measures for the prevention and removal of threats to the peace, and for the suppression of acts of aggression or other breaches of the peace, and to bring about by peaceful means, and in conformity with the principles of justice and international law, adjustment or settlement of international disputes or situations which might lead to a breach of the peace.”
Article 2 adds, “The Organization and its Members, in pursuit of the Purposes stated in Article 1, shall act in accordance with the following Principles. … All Members, in order to ensure to all of them the rights and benefits resulting from membership, shall fulfill in good faith the obligations assumed by them in accordance with the present Charter. All Members shall settle their international disputes by peaceful means in such a manner that international peace and security, and justice, are not endangered. All Members shall refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state, or in any other manner inconsistent with the Purposes of the United Nations.”
Any war leads to catastrophic humanitarian toll. If I recall Pakistani war with strong support by the execrable Uncle Sam in 1971 waged against us causing Brobdingnagian sufferings to our people, my eyes well-up every time! I condemn Russia for this war on Ukraine. I condemn Uncle Sam and its widespread use of disinformation by its controlled media and social media outlets. Their steady stream of fabricated claims is putting additional lives at risk. We should commit to countering their disinformation campaign.
War is unjust and evil thing.
We should condemn the Russian invasion, but also recognize that the United States has been violating other nations’ sovereignty for about 10 decades.
Though U.S. and NATO policy in recent years has contributed to the current tragedy unfolding in Ukraine, responsibility rests unequivocally with the Kremlin. It is an illegal war of aggression which has quite deservedly resulted in worldwide condemnation.
There’s no excusing the invasion, but the double standards and hypocrisy coming out of Washington, D.C., are quite striking.
US-Russia rivalry is the fundamental contributor underlining the worst geopolitical crisis in the new century. For the US, NATO expansion is designed to ensure its "absolute security", but for Russia, it is an issue of life or death. NATO expansion has always been a sore spot, given the Russian view that this is a Cold War institution that persists as a mode of containment, according to Igor Zevelev, a Russian political scientist at the Wilson Center.
Thomas L. Friedman, an American political commentator and author, wrote in the New York Times that the American choice to expand NATO in 1990s was an "ill-considered decision". He recalled that Bill Perry, former defense secretary in the Clinton administration, in 2016 pointed out that the US should be blamed in the early years of NATO expansion since it led to a "bad direction", making Russians feel "very uncomfortable".
George Frost Kennan, the distinguished US architect of the strategy of containment against the Soviet Union, also expressed his frustration at NATO expansion in 1998, defining it as "the beginning of a new cold war", predicting that Russians "will gradually react quite adversely and it will affect their policies". Kennan could not conceal his disappointment against this "tragic mistake", even saying it "would make the founding fathers of this country turn over in their graves". Unfortunately, Kennan's prediction finally came true.
Mearsheimer advised that the best strategy for Ukraine is to balance between Russia and the West, specifically, to "break off its close relations with the West, especially with the US, and try to accommodate the Russians". As former US congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard said in an interview, "Biden can very easily prevent a war with Russia by guaranteeing that Ukraine will not become a member of NATO." However, people in the diplomatic establishment will never acknowledge this mistake, instead formulating a strategy to blame Russia and exploit the suffering of Ukrainian people.
Throughout this crisis, Ukraine has been a tool for the US to contain Russia. But they should never expect the US and NATO to sincerely offer any serious security guarantee.
The crisis offers a reflection of the cold-war mentality and zero-sum game pursued by the US for its own narrow geopolitical gains. The US must realize that the one playing with fire will inevitably get burned.
With the support of the United States, Ukraine can organise provocations that serve as a pretext for hostilities in the Crimea region. Uncle Sam has actually already turned Ukraine into his colony, which, if desired, can be used as a large military training ground near the Russian borders. But for now, what they did, provoke Russia.
Today, provocative actions continue in the long-suffering Donbas, but on instructions from Washington, Ukrainian militants will immediately switch to another territory.
Ukraine became a failed American colony; modern Ukraine was created as a country for death in the name of American interests.
The UN and its Secretary-General have emerged only as the apple polisher of Uncle Sam and its mango-twigs nations of NATO. So, the UN should cease to exist!
-The End –
The writer is an independent political analyst based in Dhaka, Bangladesh, who writes on politics, political and human-centred figures, current and international affairs.
Post a Comment