OPINION - United Nations in its 75th year of establishment

ISTANBUL

After the two world wars in the last century, joint institutions were formed to bring the states together to resolve any disputes through peace. Following the First World War, the League of Nations (Cemiyet-i Akvâm) was established. The United Nations (UN) was also established right after the Second World War. But since the victorious states formed these unions after both world wars, they were unable to bring the desired peace and tranquility to the world. On the contrary, they became the source of unrest.

Following the First World War, the Paris Peace Conference convened to discuss the framework of the treaties to be concluded. At its meeting on 25 January 1919, it was decided to establish a League of Nations that would ensure and maintain international peace and security.

The convention of the League of Nations, prepared by the commission established to fulfill this decision, was adopted by the Treaty of Versailles, signed on 28 June 1919. It was established in Switzerland with the entry into force of the treaty on 10 January 1920 under the name “League of Nations” (Cemiyet-i Akvâm).

The purpose of this organization was to solve problems between countries by peaceful means, but it failed to show a serious presence. The League of Nations, established after the First World War, could not prevent the outbreak of the Second World War. Following World War II, it was disbanded in 1946.

The concept of the United Nations was used for the first time by Franklin D. Roosevelt during World War I for the allied countries. It was not a structure that represented all the countries in the world, as it is now understood, but it was a concept that originally meant the allied states. The allied forces at the time were precisely what was called “United Nations combat forces”.

On April 25, 1945, 850 representatives from 50 countries met at the San Francisco Conference and gave the final form to the 111-article treaty, which was unanimously adopted on June 25, 1945. On 24 October 1945, the treaty was ratified by the majority of the member states and the United Nations (UN) was established, with its head office in New York.

Trygve Lie, the first secretary-general of the UN, and John D. Rockefeller Jr. established contacts to build the UN building in New York. Rockefeller purchased the slaughterhouse site where the present UN building stands and donated it to the UN. Although the withdrawal of the Soviet forces from Iran made efforts on issues such as a ceasefire in Kashmir, it was De Lie who gave the greatest support for Israel's establishment, which meant a declaration of war.

One of the first things the UN did was to secure the establishment of Israel. Moreover, although the UN has taken many decisions against Israeli state terrorism to the present date, it has not implemented any of them.

With the Bretton Woods Agreement of July 1944, the monetary and financial system of the world was built. This agreement also established the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank. In 1971, the “gold exchange standard”, which had been introduced with the Bretton Woods, collapsed when the US abolished the convertibility of the dollar into gold.

There has been anarchy in the world monetary and financial system since 1971. In the same way, since the UN was unable to prevent the wars that emerged from its foundation, and since it has become a structure that legitimizes Israeli and American invasions, global anarchy in the world continues. The principles of a free-market economy, advocated by the United States as a hegemonic power after World War II, shaped the functioning of the international finance and trade over the dollar.

The current structure of the UN and the work needed to be done

The UN is a structure established 75 years ago based on the balance of political and military power. The United Nations Security Council (UNSC) resolutions are taken on the condition that a motion issued by the member states is adopted by 9 of the 15 member states and does not receive a vote of rejection from one of the UNSC's permanent member states.

The UN has failed to ensure the “peace and security”, which has been its main promise since its foundation. As a result of this, objections to the structure of the UNSC and the veto power of its 5 permanent members are rising. The UN has put forward the institution of the UN Interim membership to ease the response and to stall the reactionaries. But as such, the UN has worked as a mechanism to perpetuate the atrocities of the sovereign and the powerful.

The United Nations was established with 51 countries. Today, there are 193 independent countries recognized by the UN in the world. Even though 75 years have passed, the number of countries in the world has quadrupled and the world has moved into the post-digital era, the UN is still struggling to maintain the status quo and stay in the same structure. The UNSC is trying to stall the world with its Temporary Membership. Currently, 142 countries are forced to comply with the decisions taken by these structures, which were established at a time when these countries did not exist.

Today, 56 members of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (27 of whom are also members of the African Union), 54 members of the African Union, and 32 members of the Latin American and Caribbean Union have no place in the UN Security Council and no veto rights.
Since there is no central authority to control and punish those who fail to comply with the agreements, rules or resolutions signed by the UN today, the UNSC member states exercise the power of the UN and, when it is in their interests, violate the conventions/resolutions.
There are over 60 institutions, agencies, funds, and programs working under the umbrella of the UN. With these organizations under its umbrella, the UN regulates the international system on almost all issues such as health, food, environment, development, refugees, asylum seekers, international transport, tourism.

What needs to be done now is to change the name of the UN, starting with the name “League of Nations” again, and then to change the structure of the UNSC to represent all regions. The international system we live in today’s world is a capitalist system that facilitates the affairs of the hegemonic and dominant forces. International organizations such as the UN are the regulator and controller of the infrastructure of this global capitalist system. This is a kind of modern new form of colonialism.

“The world is bigger than five”, which President Erdogan has repeatedly stated at the UN meetings, is important for the establishment of a new world, and his rhetoric that the fate of humanity cannot be left to the elderly of a limited number of countries, and that it is necessary to change the mentality and institutions.

The Role of the UN in the genocides

The United States, Russia, China, France, and the United Kingdom, which are the five permanent members of the UNSC with the power of veto, are also the countries that produce and market the most weapons in the world. It is futile to expect the Security Council, which is composed of the leading actors of the world arms trade, to contribute permanently to world peace. The sources of these conflicts are themselves, not just the protectors of wars and conflicts. What is important for the capitalist system is the sale of weapons; it is of no value to whom it kills, unless it is directed towards itself.

Therefore, the “peacekeeping” troops sent by the UN to prevent the conflicts operate as a “fighting force”. For example, the soldiers of some Western countries (mainly France and the Netherlands) who served under the UN umbrella in Rwanda have been implicated in genocide. The mission of the UN peacekeeping force in Rwanda was in Canada. The UNSC did not allow the peacekeepers to stop the massacre. Thousands of people who had taken refuge there were killed after soldiers were removed from the school where Belgian soldiers had settled in Kigali.

The UN has completely failed. On June 22, 1994, the UNSC allowed France to send troops to Goma in Congo for humanitarian assistance under the name of the “turquoise mission”. But France helped the Hutu army and its militants instead of protecting the Tutsis that were murdered there. Thousands of Tutsis were killed in the French-controlled area.

French soldiers fought against the Rwandan Patriotic Front. Moreover, it was revealed that the UN troops stationed in the Democratic Republic of Congo had supplied the rebel militias with gold and ivory and that the rebels had committed genocide in Rwanda with these weapons supplied by the UN. But all of these were covered up. UN officials said they were unable to deepen the investigation for political reasons.

Britain committed genocide against Kenyans who revolted for independence in Kenya in 1952, murdering tens of thousands of Kenyans and suppressing the independence struggle. During the Cold War, the United States killed between 1 and 2 million people in Vietnam; nearly 1 million died in a CIA-backed army coup in Indonesia; and many died in Cambodia between 1969-75 due to the bombings, starvation, and political turmoil. Besides, governments in several countries have been ousted with US support. On the other hand, the UN did not account for any of these.

-United Nations and the Islamic world

Since its inception, no Muslim has been elected to the Office of UN Secretary-General. Butros Gali was elected from Egypt, but he was also a Christian. Turkey can also mobilize the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, the D8, and the Turkish Republic to elect a Muslim person to the UN Secretary-General. This will also pave the way for reform at the UN.

Of the 60 sub-agencies and organizations of the UN, none of the most important ones is in a central Islamic country. Only the headquarters of the West Asian Economic and Social Council (ESCWA), a trivial organization whose accomplishments are unclear, is located in Beirut, the Lebanese capital. There is also the United Nations Relief for Palestinian Refugees (UNRWA), a Gaza-based organization with 20 thousand employees (wherever they work now) who claim that they are helping refugees in Palestine, where Israel is terrorizing them.

The UN has also remained silent against the US's destruction, injustice, and lawlessness in the Islamic world. The United States massacred thousands in Lebanon in 1983. As the societies of the countries in the Islamic world slowly began to have a real say, it worked to destabilize and destroy them. With the invasion of Iraq after the US attack on the Gulf in 1990, for the first time since the Mongols, Baghdad experienced such devastation, over a million people, died in the process.

The United Nations Security Council, which accepts the wardership of the interests of the United States as its first duty, has adopted a resolution on December 4, 1992, to rescue the Somali people from the famine drama in Somalia(!) embarked on a military operation under the name “Operation Hope”. The purpose of this occupation movement, called ”Operation Hope", was to plunge Somalia into deep chaos, and they succeeded in it; Somalia still has not recovered.

The brutal genocide in Bosnia is another dark chapter in the history of the United Nations. In 1993, the UN declared Srebrenica a “safe zone” for Bosnians. Thousands of Bosnians had taken refuge at the headquarters of the UN peacekeeping force, made up of Dutch soldiers. The weapons in the hands of Muslims had been collected by the UN peacekeepers on protection grounds. Upon the siege of the camp by Serbian forces, the UN troops personally handed over thousands of Bosnians to the Serbs in 1995, causing them to suffer genocide. The UN has yet to account for this.

After Iraq, Afghanistan was invaded on the pretext of September 11. When it was not enough, Tunisia, Egypt, Libya, Yemen, and finally Sudan was plunged into chaos during the Arab Spring. In the Middle East, the United States bombed Afghanistan and Iraq with the aim of “bringing democracy to the oppressed and those living in undemocratic conditions”. It is trying to erase the traces of the Islamic civilization that was built, lived, and still lives on this land by mass killing and displacing the people in this region.

Muslim societies and the people of the oppressed third world countries, or so-called “failed states,” are fed up with the treatment, hurtful behavior, and degrading treatment of their leaders at the international meetings. These people are in the expectations of our country because of its historical background and its role in history.

COVID-19, UN, and WHO

The process of the new type coronavirus (COVID-19) has shown that the developments in one region of the world affect all other countries. In the past, famine, civil wars, the devastation of powerful countries like the United States and Russia around the world and the cries of the millions they killed were unheard of in Washington, in London, in Paris or Moscow. For the first time, the citizens of these countries have experienced the cold face of death in a massive sense.

They have seen that death could find not only third world countries but also themselves. Nations that made no noise and approved while their states rained bombs on innocent people saw the cold face of death as it appeared from television screens. Of course, pain is huge and very hard. It is hoped that this process will reignite human feelings of compassion towards each other and towards nature and remind humans of their humanity.

In the process of COVID-19, the World Health Organization (WHO), operating under the UN, has failed to uncover the structure of this virus, to provide sufficient information to the world, and to prevent the outbreak. The WHO was able to explain this figure without a single study confirming the 3.4 percent mortality estimation.

The WHO has to explain which academic studies and press organizations are involved in COVID-19 manipulation. Having witnessed medical fraud and false outbreak reports before, the WHO has turned into a subcontracting mechanism for the world vaccine lobby. As a result of these failures, even the US today announced it would suspend the funding to the WHO; Brazil is also about to leave. However, what needs to be done is to completely change the structure of the UN.

Conclusion

This already decadent world order is built on blood and tears. Structures that are condemned to capitalist ambitions, callous, soulless, unscrupulous, and do not pay attention to human, whose compassion has died/killed cannot bring peace to the world. We hope that as a result of this epidemic process, all of the UN member states will be able to support the establishment of 75 countries.

They cooperate in reforming the UN and establishing an equitable world order. If this is not done, greater domination over humanity will be established with digitized life-forms. What they could not do even in the atomic age, they would do in digitized life.

* The writer is the Chairman of the African Center for Strategic Studies (AFSAM)

* Opinions expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Anadolu Agency.

* Translated by Merve Dastan in Ankara