Cooler heads prevailed on Disabilities Treaty
The Hill, a newspaper for people who work on U.S. federal legislation, ran Dr. Susan Yoshihara’s op ed today on the defeat of the vote on the UN Disability treaty. Dr. Yoshihara, who participated in the negotiations of the UN treaty, anticipated the political attacks that may come against the dissenting senators. Her op ed [...]
Disability Treaty Goes to Senate Floor
Senator Reid made a motion yesterday to move the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) to executive session. The motion passed allowing debate to follow. Foreign Relations committee chairman Sen. John Kerry followed with an opening statement in which he tried to assure senators that the convention would not grant any new [...]
Human Rights Official Riles Up UN Delegates, Fire Alarm Goes Off
Yesterday was UN Day. A day to celebrate the accomplishments of the world’s only universal international organization, and the progress of the world’s nations towards a brighter more peaceful future. But UN delegates at the third committee meeting of the 67th plenary session of the General Assembly were more concerned with highlighting overreaching by the High Commissioner for Human Rights, Ms. [...]
No Need to Ratify New UN Treaty
Yesterday Wendy Wright and I spent our lunch hour at the new state of the art US Mission to the UN at 45th St and 1st Ave. We attended a side event hosted by the US delegation to the UN on Disability Rights. The side event was held because of the ongoing Conference of States Parties [...]
Human Rights Roulette: What it Means to Ratify a New UN Treaty
The United Nations Convention on the Protection of Persons with Disabilities is certainly a nobly inspired document, but it creates more problems than it solves. The Senate thankfully has not been able to vote on the ratification of the new treaty, this week, in time for the summer recess. But sooner, rather than later, and possibly as soon [...]
Rio + 20: No Guarantees of a Sustainable Future
The UN Conference on Sustainable Development in Rio De Janeiro, Brazil, is now in its third day. It has been touted as the most significant UN Conference ever. That’s what we’ve been hearing from the Secretary General and his UN political sales fleet made up of high and low ranking UN staff and delegations for [...]
How Much “Green” Does it Take to Make the Green Economy? G77 Derailing the Green Agenda at the UN
Are you wondering how many businesses have to become “green” before the dream of the “green economy” becomes a reality? It seems like everything has to be green nowadays, whether its green jobs, green energy, or green skills. Now there is even green dry cleaning. Duh! If you feel like this is going to far, [...]
Sovereignty in Action: Beating Back Beaurocratic Inertia at the UN
Sovereignty is a word that isn’t used within the UN superstructure, its bureaucracies, thousands of documents, reports and resolutions and frankly even UN member states. The UN system always tries to work towards achieving consensus, and to merely mention that each and every individual state has a the power and sovereign prerogative to undo consensus [...]
The End of the MDGs?
This morning the Secretary General, and Rebeca Grynspan, Associate Administrator of UNDP, and Professor Jeffrey Sachs, Special Adviser on the MDGs, held a press conference to report on the progress towards achieving the MDG’s. The SG described Sachs and Grynspan as his “top development experts and senior advisers.” They cited a report issued this week [...]
Columbus Day Shenanigans at the UN
UN Reform Bill Gets 100 Sponsors in US Congress
The proposed new US law on UN reform was introduced a month ago by Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen with 57 co-sponsors and now has about 100. Among other things, the law would curtail funding to the Human Rights Council and give the UN two years to enact its required reforms before cutting off US contributions. Here [...]
US Lambastes $238K Average UN Salaries and more
The US representative to the UN for mangagement and reform delivered a scathing critique of the new UN budget–which was delivered piecemeal and incomplete to donors and reflects a massive spending increase that outpaces inflation. With 15 reports still to be considered, the UN budget is already at “an alarming” $5.5B, the US said. Considered [...]
Fox guards hen house at UNFPA
The US remarks at the UNFPA executive board meeting make me long for the days when at least one donor used these meetings to (at least attempt to) hold the executive director accountable for the lack of transparency, inordinate focus on advocacy for unwanted programs, and other management problems at UNFPA. This year, the Obama [...]
10 Reasons for Congress to Stay True to Defunding UNFPA
Here are ten reasons why the United States Congress should maintain their ground on defunding UNFPA. In a time where the US is struggling financially, there’s no need to fund an agency like this until serious reform and accountability become the new norms. See the Twitter screenshots below to find out how UNFPA was caught [...]
Reality Check for RH Reality Check
Today, RH Reality Check accused Rep. Latta (OH) of being a bully, and then went on to define the term “pro-life” in wholly disingenuous terms while worrying about cutting US tax dollar contributions to international “family planning.” Yet, a brief look at RH Reality Check’s definition and scare tactic statistics shows that they aren’t really [...]
US-Funded Marie Stopes’ Video Promotes Anal Sex to Avoid Pregnancy
Abortion giant Marie Stopes International, which is funded by UNFPA and USAID, sponsors a website called “Have a LARC” (for Long Acting Reversible Contraception). Prominent on the homepage of the website is the deplorable video “Use Ya Head”, by some outfit called The Midnight Beast. The graphic video features simulated sex with a naked blow-up [...]
US Ambassador: Keep US Funding to UN
In answer to recent calls by US policymakers to cut UN funding, US Ambassador Rice has begun a series of speeches to rally support for US funding to the organization. Republicans have looked to scaling back on UN funding as one measure to help deal with a soaring deficit. House Foreign Affairs Committee chairman Ileana [...]
State Department Vs. New Congress on UN Reform
UN reform is high on the list of the new Republican-controlled House in the US. The Obama administration has talked often about the need for real UN reform. The State Department has also made such calls. Just this week, the new head of UNFPA said that accountability would be the agency’s number one priority. So [...]
More on US hearing on UN funding
Colum Lynch’s blog at Foreign Policy recapped Tuesday’s Congressional hearing on UN reform and funding: Ros-Lehtinen’s funding proposal echoed a similar plan put forward by John R. Bolton, the former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations during the Bush Administration, to make funding to the U.N. multibillion administrative and peacekeeping budgets entirely voluntary. The U.S. [...]
New Head of US House Foreign Affairs Committee Wants UN Funding Slashed
Yesterday, the House Foreign Affairs Committee held a briefing titled, “The United Nations: Urgent Problems that Need Congressional Action.” Facing a huge deficit, Republican took aim at UN funding. Though Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-Florida), the chairman of the committee, was unable to attend, she continued her push to slash US funding to an unreformed UN. Ros-Lehtinen’s [...]