The current devastating conflicts, the most obvious of which are Russia’s war against Ukraine and the Israel-Hezbollah-Palestine war, in the balance of 23 conflicts involving up to thirty countries, demonstrate a major failure of the United Nations (UN). .) in his mandate to intervene to prevent wars and promote peace.

These twenty wars affect more than 1.1 billion people (14% of the world’s population). If we add to this the conflicts against drug trafficking and the fight against them, the total number of countries in conflict rises to 58.

Article 1. NN. The United States claims that its creation is the result of a mandate to “maintain international peace and security and, to that end: take effective collective measures to prevent and eliminate threats to the peace, and to suppress acts of aggression or other breaches of the peace.” ; and achieve by peaceful means, and in accordance with the principles of justice and international law, the adjustment or settlement of international disputes or situations that could lead to a breach of the peace.”

He recently added that “there are new, more complex and sophisticated threats that require imaginative and bold responses and greater cooperation between member states and between the private sector and civil society.” At the same time, institutional boundaries must be crossed so that political partners, human rights and development partners can work in harmony.”

The United Nations should be urgently reformed or replaced by a more competent organization. One of these organizational reforms is the democratic composition of the Security Council, which today has five permanent members among its fifteen members: China, the United States, France, Russia and the United Kingdom, which have the right to veto and often block measures in line with world peace.

The United Nations needs to be reformed… or replaced by a more competent organization.

The second reform is the one they emphasize: greater cooperation with civil society and the private sector, which is two-way, not only consultation but also decision making. Many member states are ruled by narco-governments or de facto dictatorships. The debate about truly representative systems of government, which respect diversity but do not give in to what we all consider a crime and a violation of fundamental rights, is still in its infancy.

Craig Mokhiber, director of the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights in New York, announced his resignation in questionable terms. I extract a few lines from his long letter.

“I am writing to you at a time of great distress for the world, including many of our colleagues. (I also worked at the UN) during the genocide against Tutsis, Bosnian Muslims, Yezidis and Rohingya. In any case, as the dust settled on the horrors perpetrated on the defenseless civilian population, it became painfully obvious that we had failed in our duty to meet the imperatives of preventing mass crimes, protecting the vulnerable and holding perpetrators accountable. “We have lost a lot with this abandonment, including our own global credibility.” (OR)