Proofs of Propositions 10-13

expanded quickly. Secretary-General Boutros Ghali, outlines the ambitious role of the UN in his seminal report: An agenda for peace. The report described interconnected roles for the UN to maintain peace and security in the post-cold war context race include:

• Preventive diplomacy: involving confidence-building measures, fact fording and preventive development of UN authorized forces.

• Peacemaking: designed to bring hostile parties to agreement, especially through peaceful means. However when all peaceful means have failed, peace enforcement authorized under chapter VII of the charter may be necessary. Peace enforcement may occur without the consent of the parties.

• Peace-keeping: the development of a UN presence in the field with the consent of all parties, this refers to classical peace-keeping.

• Post-conflict peace building: to develop the social political and economic infrastructure to prevent further violence and to consolidate peace.

Although the UN does not have many striking successes to its credit in the handling of political disputes, its services as a mediator have been valuable in several instances. The work of the UN Committee of Good Offices in Indonesia, the services of various UN commission;, dealing with Greek frontier incidents, India and Pakistan, and Palestine, and the indefatigable labors of Count Bernadotte and Dr. Ralph Bunche in the delicate negotiations between Jewish and Arab spokesmen - all these deserve high commendation, much more than has yet been accorded. Although the efforts of other commissions and committees, such as the UN Temporary Commission on Korea and the Technical Committee on Berlin Currency and Trade, were less fruitful, they were nonetheless conscientious and zealous, and their limited results were due to circumstances beyond their control.

In all of the political disputes which have been discussed in this chapter, the UN played a useful and significant and sometimes a peripheral and limited role. The value of the UN presence in such crisis areas as Kashmir, Korea, the Gaza Strip, West Irian, the Congo, and Cyprus can hardly be denied, although it is sometimes overlooked or denigrated.

In dealing with security problems, however, the UN has run into obstructions just as real as, and even more serious than, those faced in political disputes. The main security agencies of the Security Council- the Military Staff Committee, the Commission for Conventional Armaments, the Atomic Energy Commission, and the Disarmament Commission - prepared elaborate plans which the majority approved, but all of these plans encountered the great power deadlock that has frustrated every effort to implement the international cooperation everywhere in the postwar period. If the failure to provide armed forces for the United Nations and to regulate and reduce armaments is particularly serious - as it certainly is - what shall be said of the complete impasse in the efforts to set up an effective system for the international control of atomic energy? Atomic control may well be the central problem in the international relations of our time. Even if the choice is not so inexorably between "one world or none," as many scientists tell us, or between "the quick and the dead," to use Bernard Baruch's phrase, the problem is still a crucial one Until some answer is found to the question of the control of the power of the atom, an answer which, we can be sure, must be sought on the inter-national plane, insecurity and ever-present danger will be the lot of the people of the world.

It would be unfair to blame the United Nations for this most tragic of failures on the international scene. The roots of this failure lie deeply embedded in nationalism, sovereignty, and nation-state psychology, and also in the perversities of the human race. The United Nations has made a thorough study of the technical and political requirements for the effective control of atomic energy; beyond that it

cannot go unless the peoples of the world, or at least those of the great powers, are willing to support its efforts on their behalf.

Self Assessment Exercise

Q l. What are the 4 main activities of peace keeping operation of the UN?

Q2. What are the main points of the UN agenda for peace?

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Possible Answers

Q1 Answers found in 3.1 Q2 Answer found in 3.2.4 4.0 CONCLUSION

The United Nations is the only global institution with the legitimacy that derives from universal membership, and a mandate that encompasses security, economies and social development, the protection of human rights, and the protection of environment. Yet the UN was created by states for states and the relationship between sovereignty and the limits of UN action has remained key issues.

Despite the growth in UN activities, however, there are some questions about the relevance and effectiveness of the UN. The failure, for instance, to get clear the UN Security Council authorization for the war in Iraq in 2003, led to well publicized criticism of the UN and a crises in international relations.

5.0 SUMMARY

The United Nations reflects the hope for a just and peaceful global community.

The UN is charged with the responsibilities for the maintenance of international peace and security.

One of the most difficult tasks of the UN has been the adjustment of political disputes. The Security Council is bound to no specific procedure, it is authorized to use any or all of several indicated ways of searching a settlement, or it may device ways of its own.

Secretary-Generals have in their turns put forward their proposals or agenda for peace, but whether they are pursued, and or realized become another question.

All in all, UN has scored some successes in some areas of functional activity including in security, social, morals and so forth.

6.0 TUTOR - MARKED ASSIGNMENT

Q1. With reference to Article 1 of the UN Charter, what is expected of the United Nations?

Q2. How does chapter VII of the United Nations define the broad area of

"security problem."?

Each question carries 5 marks. The total score is 10 marks.

7.0 REFERENCES/FURTHER READING

"Issues before the Nineteenth General Assembly" International Reconciliation, No. 550, November, 1964, 21 - 22.

Article "Peace" in the Americana Annual, 1965 (New York: America Corp, 1965) 555.

Claude, Inis L. Jr. Swords into Plowshares: the progress and problems of international organization, 4^th edition (New York: Random House, 1971). A classic text on the history of international institutions. Covers all the major themes, but particularly concerned with their role in the war and peace useful for the history of the UN.

Inis L. Claude, Jr., "The United Nations: The Use of Force." International Concilia No. 532 (November, 1961):347.

The official records of the United Nations Atomic Energy Commission, the Disarmament Commission, the Security Council, and the General Assembly, and the Yearbook of the United Nations, contain detailed accounts of the consideration of question relating to the international control of atomic energy by the United

Nations.

Palmer, Norman D. and Howard C. Perkins, International Relations. The World Community in Transition (New Delhi: C.B.S Publishers and Distributors, 2001)

MODULE 5