Accomplishments and Failures of the United Nations

United Nations Accomplishments The United Nations has accomplished much over the last 60 years, including: peacefully negotiating 172 peace settlements that have ended regional conflicts participating in over 300 international treaties on topics from human rights conventions to agreements on the use of outer space and the oceans being involved in every major war and international crisis since its inception and serving as a catalyst for the prevention of others authorizing the international coalitions that fought in the Korean War (1950-53) and the Persian Gulf War (1991) providing a forum for mediation in the Arab-Israeli conflict resulting in numerous peace accords and keeping the conflict localized to the Middle East

UN Accomplishments, cont… using military forces (provided by member states) to conduct over 35 peacekeeping missions providing security and reducing armed conflict. In 1988, the U.N. Peace-Keeping Forces received the Nobel Prize for Peace setting up war crimes tribunals to try war criminals in the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda making great strides in raising the consciousness of human rights beginning with the “Universal Declaration of Human Rights” adopted by the General Assembly in 1948. promoting free and fair elections and helping many countries in the transition to democracy providing humanitarian efforts to more than 30 million refugees fleeing war, persecution, or famine

UN Accomplishments, cont… the International Court of Justice helping to settle numerous international disputes involving territorial issues, hostage-taking and economic rights becoming increasingly involved in providing humanitarian assistance and promoting improvements in the health of the world’s peoples through the World Health Organization (WHO) and the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF): smallpox, SARS, polio, malaria, etc. According to some estimates, up to 3 million children per year have been saved due to these efforts playing a significant role in improving agricultural techniques and increasing crop yields in Asia, Africa and South America

Failures of the United Nations: Bureaucratic inefficiency: with so many commissions, committees, and associated agencies, it often seems that one agency or governing organ has no idea what another is doing. In some cases one UN agency might compete against another. It failed to enforce 17 resolutions against Saddam, tolerating his ejection of UN weapons inspectors, and enabling him to stay in power by looking the other way as he exploited Oil for Food.  Apparently, there was widespread corruption among the many companies that did business with Saddam’s regime.  Additionally, Saddam promoted business with countries who voted against enforcing the UN’s own resolutions against him.

UN Failures cont… The UN and former Secretary General Kofi Annan have been accused of incompetence, mismanagement and possible corruption in the Oil-For-Food Program for Iraq. It failed to use UN peacekeepers already in place to stop the Rwanda genocide in 1994 and more recently to stop the massacre of African Muslims in Sudan’s Darfur province. It has failed to resolve the North Korean and Iranian violations of the nuclear non-proliferation agreements. The UN’s task in the area of human rights is complicated by its respect for national sovereignty and national boundaries.  This often conflicts with ethnic tensions and the interests of ethnic groups living on opposite sides of a national border

Sources… Go to the following sites for further information: http://www.lwvjeffco.org/UNhistory.html http://www-tc.pbs.org/newshour/extra/teachers/lessonplans/socialstudies/un_sh_background.pdf