UNsensational? Five more years of Ban Ki-moon

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U.S. Senators Joe Lieberman and John Kerry look on as U.N.

chief Ban Ki-moon addresses reporters in Washington.

REUTERS/Molley Riley

It’s hard to find a delegate to the United Nations who despises U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon. But it’s even harder to find someone who thinks he has the gravitas and charisma of his Nobel Peace Prize-winning predecessor Kofi Annan, who invoked the wrath of the previous U.S. administration when he called the 2003 invasion of Iraq “illegal.” As one senior Western official, who declined to be identified, said about Ban: “It’s not as if he’s lightning in a bottle, but we can live with him.”

The former South Korean foreign minister is in the final year of his first five-year term and is widely expected to run for another stint as the supreme U.N. official. The formal re-election process is likely to commence in the coming months. In the meantime, Ban is visiting the capitals of key U.N. member states to gauge his chances of keeping his job. Those chances, U.N. diplomats say, are excellent. So far, no country has nominated any candidate to oppose him. “I’d put my money on Ban Ki-moon getting a second term,” said a Security Council diplomat.

The 15-nation Security Council nominates the secretary-general, though the choice has to be confirmed by the 192-nation General Assembly. Despite the veneer of democracy, it is the five veto-wielding permanent council members — Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States — who choose the top U.N. bureaucrat in New York. And none of the five has a serious objections to a second and final term for Ban, diplomats say.

Some people say that running the United Nations is the toughest job on earth. With little real power, he spends his time mediating and negotiating behind closed doors, getting blamed for member states’ failures and receiving no credit for his off-camera successes. National lobbyists push and pull him in all directions. The five permanent Security Council members, known as the “P5″, regularly insist that he acquiesce to their demands, often insisting on a healthy portion of top U.N. jobs for their nationals or preferential treatment for themselves or their allies. Journalists harangue the secretary-general to disclose the details of sensitive negotiations, which he usually tries to keep secret under the label of “quiet diplomacy.” Human rights groups routinely skewer him for not being tough enough on the rulers of despotic countries, which are, after all, member states like all the others and don’t take kindly to criticism.

Ban has been no exception. He has been publicly clobbered for not congratulating jailed Chinese dissident Liu Xiaobo for winning the 2010 Nobel Peace Prize or raising his detention with President Hu Jintao during a recent visit to China. He was hung out to dry for not being tough enough on Sri Lanka’s government and Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir, who was indicted by the International Criminal Court for genocide in Sudan’s western Darfur region. Arab and other delegations from the developing world accuse Ban of being a U.S. lackey, noting how often his statements on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and other issues echo those of the U.S. State Department or White House.

As much as Ban has sought to please his P5 kingmakers, he has managed to run afoul of each of them in the past. In 2008 Russia accused him of siding with the United States, France and Britain in supporting the secession of Kosovo from Serbia, which Moscow fiercely opposed. U.N. officials said at the time that Russia even threatened to block his second term over Kosovo (Ban made it up to them later). Both China and Russia complained that Ban had voiced public support for Egyptian demonstrators calling for the ouster of President Hosni Mubarak, who resigned last week. The United States, Britain and France were annoyed with Ban in 2009 for departing from past practice and not referring to the Georgian breakaway region of Abkhazia as part of Georgia. The Georgian ambassador accused Ban of succumbing to pressure from Russia, which fought a brief war against the former Soviet republic of Georgia in 2008. Ban denied the charge.

Ban’s unwavering stance against Ivory Coast’s incumbent leader Laurent Gbagbo, who refused to recognize U.N. certified election results from November 2010 that say he lost to rival Alassane Ouattara, surprised many U.N. watchers who are more accustomed to seeing him sitting on the fence on tough issues. Philippe Bolopion of Human Rights Watch, who has been one of the secretary-general’s toughest critics, welcomed Ban’s “swift and unequivocal reaction” to Gbagbo, who ordered U.N. peacekeepers out of the world’s top cocoa producer. So far the secretary-general has refused to withdraw his blue helmets and the deadlock continues.

Ex-UN official opposes re-election of UN's Ban

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STOCKHOLM (Reuters) - The former head of the internal oversight office of the United Nations, who quit last year accusing Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon of poor leadership, said on Thursday his re-election would be an embarrassment.

Ban's first five-year term expires at the end of the year. He has not so far formally announced that he will stand for a second term, but is widely expected to do so.

Inga-Britt Ahlenius of Sweden, who led the U.N. Office of Internal Oversight Services (OIOS) until last July, repeated criticism from her end-of-assignment report that the world body was "falling apart" and "drifting into irrelevance" under Ban. The confidential report was leaked to media at the time.

"If my report, which is read and known by all in the secretariat ... becomes widely known, I think it would be pretty embarrassing if he was re-elected. Because that would show that the superpowers could not care less whether the U.N. is a relevant organisation or not," Ahlenius said.

Presenting a book co-written with a journalist on what she called the "decay" of the United Nations, she said mismanagement of the U.N. secretariat affected the organisation's ability to carry out its tasks.

Diplomats give the South Korean U.N. chief a good chance of re-election since he has avoided big conflicts with key powers the United States and China, as well as other permanent members of the Security Council. The council makes a recommendation which is then voted on by the 192-nation General Assembly.

But Ahlenius said that while Washington appeared comfortable with Ban, some member states were critical of him. She hoped her report, and book if translated into English, would make other countries "see that the U.N. can't survive with a person that can't lead the organisation."

She also said the secretary-general should serve one term only, although she suggested that could be extended to six or seven years from the current five.

"The secretary-general should absolutely, in my opinion, have one time-limited mandate," she said. "That would prevent the person concerned being too flexible towards the superpowers and spending too much time on his re-election," she said.

During her time as head of the OIOS, which carries out internal disciplinary inquiries, Ahlenius feuded with Ban over her powers of appointment.

She said he had undermined her unit by preventing her from appointing a former U.S. attorney as head of the OIOS investigations unit. Ban said he was simply following U.N. procedures.

Did Ban Ki moon just announce his plans to seek a second term as U.N. secretary general?

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Posted By Colum Lynch Saturday, January 1, 2011

Ban Ki moon has never been known as a straight talker. But tonight he seemed to reach new heights of circumspection, seemingly declaring his intention to run for a second five-year term as secretary general without actually saying so.

The revelation was buried in an official U.N. readout of a New Year's day exchange Ban had with South Korean president, Lee Myung-bak. In it, Ban offers his best wishes to the South Korean president-- the only leader to be so honored-- underscoring the importance the U.N.'s South Korean secretary general continues to place in maintaining close ties with the government that helped promote his rise to the world's top diplomatic job.

Ban's readout--which was issued Saturday evening without fanfare and while most of the press corps was on holiday -- seemed innocuous enough on first glance. Ban praised Seoul for its "active contribution to the work of the United Nations, including through an increase in overseas development assistance and greater participation in peace operations, as well as to global efforts to address climate change and promote green growth," according to the readout. Ban also lauded Lee for his "successful" hosting of a G-20 summit and for South Korea's continued "economic and social development" in 2o10.

For good measure, the readout notes that Ban and Lee discussed the crisis on the Korean peninsula. Ban -- who has been seeking a mediation role there since his first months as secretary general-- said he appreciated Lee's recent decision to try to resolve the nuclear standoff through the resumption of six-nation political talks, a move that effectively sidelines the U.N. Still, Ban appeared hopeful, offering once again to "provide any assistance, as appropriate, in facilitating peace and stability in the region in close coordination with the concerned countries."

But down in the final sentence of the readout, Ban's office blandly notes that the "secretary general looks forward to the 2012 Nuclear Security Summit to be hosted by the ROK[Republic of Korea], an event which would significantly contribute to strengthening the global nuclear non-proliferation regime." A careful reader will recall that Ban's first five-year term expires at the end of 2011, meaning he would need to be reelected in order to attend the Korean summit as secretary general.

Although Ban has signaled for months his intention to run for a second term, he has been declined to publicly announce his plans. Pressed on his intentions last month during a year-end press conference, Ban appealed for patience but said he would make his intention known soon. I'm not sure whether this counts.

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Ban Ki-moon must go - he's a liability!

a Nordic diplomat speaking at a reception held at the UN, with a glass of red wine in hand, said that Ban Ki-moon's involvement in past failed Sun-shine-policy towards North Korea, as well as his failed engagements in Myanmar, Haiti and lately with Human Rights issues in China, have made him more of a "liability for many western countries".

The Nordic diplomat stated that wouldn't be a surprise that "many member to throw their support to either current president of East Timor or for a "one-term-only" for Helen Clark (former PM of New Zealand)".

The Nordic diplomat explained that Ban's failure to "institutionalize real change in the UN, reorganizing and bringing more transparency, while reducing costs in a tough economic times" is seen as another important management failure of his "Korean team".

In view of recent Wikileaks releases, the Diplomat said that "is expected that Ban will use this publicity to get votes from american foes as well as those friends that are unhappy with the content of the leaked documents", but the Diplomat thought it might be counter-productive because many donors have already made up their mind on "discontinuing Ban" for other reasons.