UN Tribune

Jan 20, 2014 - UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has rescinded his invitation to Iran to participate in the Geneva II Syria talks on Wednesday. In New York, Ban's spokesperson, Martin Nesirky, reading from a prepared statement, said Monday: "In a series of meetings and telephone conversations, senior Iranian officials assured the Secretary-General that Iran understood and supported the basis and goal of the Conference, including the Geneva Communiqué. "The Secretary-General is deeply disappointed by Iranian public statements today that are not at all consistent with that stated commitment.  He continues to urge Iran to join the global consensus behind the Geneva Communiqué.  Given that it has chosen to remain outside that basic understanding, he has decided that the one-day Montreux gathering will proceed without Iran’s participation." The text of the Geneva Communiqué, which calls for a transitional government with full executive powers, is here.

Jan. 20, 2014 - Tehran's envoy to the United Nations in New York on Monday stated that Iran will not participate in the Geneva II Syria talks if it has to accept the Geneva communique.

Here is the response by the mission's spokesperson, Alireza Miryousefi:

"Regarding to the inquiry of the position of the Islamic Republic of Iran concerning the participation of Iran's Geneva II Conference, the response of permanent representative of Islamic Republic of Iran to the UN, Amb. Khazaee is as follows: The Islamic Republic of Iran appreciates the efforts of the UN Secretary General and his special envoy, Mr. Brahimi in finding a political solution for Syrian crisis. Iran has always been supportive of finding a political solution for this crisis.  

Jan. 15, 2014 - Host country Kuwait topped the list of donors at the pledging conference for Syria with the Gulf country announcing a $500 million contribution.

The United States followed with a $380 million donation. The European Commission pledged $225 million; United Kingdom, $164 million; Japan, $120 million; Germany, $110 million; Norway, $75 million; Saudi Arabia and Qatar both pledged $60 million. Rounding out the top 15 donors at the conference in Kuwait City were Italy, $51 million; Denmark, $37 million; Sweden, $35 million; Switzerland $33 million; France, $27 million; and Ireland, $27 million. A total of $2.4 billion was pledged towards a total of $6.5 billion required to support nine million Syrians in need of assistance inside and outside of Syria in 2014. UN Security Council permanent members China and Russia were not among the 37 countries that made pledges. Nor was Canada, traditionally a strong donor. The United Arab Emirates was also absent, as too was Bahrain. Iraq was the fourth largest Arab country donor, pledging $13 million. Among emerging donor countries, South Korea announced a $5 million contribution; Mexico $3 million and India, $2 million. Non-traditional donors making pledges included Estonia, $552,000; Romania, $100,000 and Botswana, $50,000, according to figures provided by UN OCHA. A full list of the countries that pledged funds is below. - Denis Fitzgerald On Twitter @denisfitz photo: UN Photo/Eskinder Debebe

UPDATED: Jan 19, 2013: Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has invited Iran to the Geneva II talks, saying on Sunday that Tehran must be part of the solution and indicating that it supports the Geneva 1 communique which called for a transitional government with full executive powers. "They (Iran) said that they are committed to play a very constructive and important positive role. And they said that they welcome the Geneva Communique," Ban said. "So based on my conversations, several times with Iranian delegations, then I am convinced that they will be in support of this Geneva Communique and they will play a very important and positive constructive role"  

Jan. 2, 2014 - China has accused Japan of seeking to clear the name of war criminals after Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's visit to a shrine that honors the country's war dead including senior officials convicted of the gravest war crimes. Beijing's UN mission in New York sent an email to reporters on Thursday stating China's position on Abe's visit, describing it as "a brazen challenge to all the victimized people in the Japanese militarist war of aggression and to the outcome of World War II and the post-war order." "Abe's action is leading Japan down an extremely dangerous path and has gravely undermined regional peace and security," the statement said. It adds that the visit to the Yasukuni shrine "honors 14 Class-A war criminals of World War II as 'heroes.'" Class A war criminals were those convicted by the International Military Tribunal for the Far East of the planning, preparation, initiation, or waging of wars of aggression. China, as one of the victors in World War II, was awarded one of the five permanent seats on the UN Security Council. Articles 53 and 107 of the UN Charter still refer to Japan and the other axis powers, Germany and Italy, as 'enemy states.' The full statement sent by China's UN mission is below. - Denis Fitzgerald On Twitter @denisfitz (image/wikimedia)

Dec. 19, 2013 - The Syrian government is continuing its policy of enforced disappearance that started in March 2011 when protests against the regime of Bashar Al-Assad erupted and the spread and pattern of this abuse amounts to a crime against humanity, UN investigators probing human rights violations in Syria concluded in their latest report.

Enforced disappearance has been used to silence the opposition, as a form of reprisal or punishment and as a tactic of war, the UN Independent Commission of Inquiry said in the report released on Thursday which covers March 2011 to Nov. 2013.

It cites instances of doctors being disappeared for providing medical services in oppositions controlled areas and injured civilians in FSA-controlled areas being disappeared when they seek treatment at government hospitals. "The violation of enforced disappearance is often a gateway to the commission of other offences, most particularly torture," the report says. It adds that there is a deliberate government policy of not providing information to family members of those detained and those inquiring are often themselves then detained.

"The truth regarding the fate of the many disappeared in Syria and the extent of the phenomenon of enforced disappearance will likely only fully be grasped in the aftermath of the conflict," the report says. "The victims of this violation number far beyond the individuals disappeared. The families and loved ones of those disappeared endure a mental anguish that amounts to a further violation of their human rights." "There are reasonable grounds to believe that enforced disappearances were committed by Government forces, as part of a widespread and systematic attack against the civilian population, and therefore amount to a crime against humanity," the report concludes.

Dec 12, 2013 - UN inspectors investigating allegations of chemical weapons use in Syria issued their final report on Thursday confirming use of chemical weapons in Syria in one "clear and convincing" case and reported on four more cases where there is credible evidence that chemical attacks took place. The team investigated seven sites and concluded that sarin gas was used in the Aug. 21 incident in Ghouta, "against civilians, including children, on a relatively large scale." The inspectors had previously confirmed this on Sept. 16. In four more incidents, including an attack in Khan Al Asal in March, the investigators collected evidence that 'suggests" is "credible" or is "consistent with" the use of chemical weapons.

The full report is below. - Denis Fitzgerald On Twitter @denisfitz

(photo/OPCW)

Jordan's FM Nasser Judeh congratulated following his country's election to a two-year term on the Security Council. (UN Photo/Amanda Voisard)

Nov. 27, 2013 - New diagnoses of the HIV virus are up nine percent in Eastern Europe, according to figures released by the World Health Organization on Thursday. Of the 131,000 new cases of HIV reported in the European region in 2012, 102,000 occurred in Eastern Europe, with 76,000 of those cases reported in Russia, accounting for almost 60 percent of new infections, according to the data which was released ahead of World Aids Day on Dec. 1. About 35 percent of HIV cases in Russia occur among injecting drug users while heterosexual transmission accounts for about 30 percent of cases. The exposure route of the remaining 35 percent is unknown but it is thought that most occur among men who have sex with men. It was reported last month that a new virulent strain of HIV in Russia was spreading at a rapid rate and accounts for more than 50 percent of new infections. The Moscow Times reported that Russian schools generally offer little or no sex education, which contributes to the high rate of infection. The paper added that Pavel Astakhov, Russia's children's rights advocate, said in September that he opposed teaching teenagers about sexual health in school, saying that Russian literature is "the best sex education there is."

Nov 10, 2013 - Foreign fighters appear to be the source of the outbreak of polio in Syria that risks infecting hundreds of thousands of children in the region.

Oct. 31, 2013 - Syria's economy has lost more than $103 billion since March 2011 while 2.3 million jobs have been lost and almost half the country's school-age children are no longer in formal education.

update: Oct 25 - In a statement on its website, Norway's ministry of foreign affairs says it won't destroy Syria's chemical warfare agents: "due to time constraints and external factors, such as capacities, regulatory requirements, Norway is not the most suitable location for the destruction of Syrian chemical warfare agents."

Oct. 20, 2013 - Up to 500 tons of Syria's stockpile of sarin gas is set to be destroyed in Norway pending agreement by Oslo. Norwegian state broadcaster NRK reported on Sunday that an internal UN memo it obtained shows that the five permanent members of the Security Council along with Albania and Belgium have been asked to destroy Syria's chemical warfare agents. But Norway, home of the Nobel Foundation that last week bestowed its annual peace prize to the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, has been asked to destroy up to half of the estimated 1,000 tons of chemical agents thought to be in Syria's possession.  A UN Security Council resolution passed on Sept. 27 set mid-2014 as deadline for destruction of Syria's entire chemical arsenal.

- Denis Fitzgerald On Twitter @denisfitz

OPCW Director-General Ahmet Üzümcü speaks to reporters after announcement that the organisation had won the 2013 Nobel Peace Prize (photo/opcw)

Oct 11, 2013 - When Libya joined the Chemical Weapons Convention in January 2004, Muammar Gaddafi declared to the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) that the country possessed some 1,400 tonnes of chemical agents and precursor chemicals, more than 3,500 chemical weapons munitions, as well as three production facilities. Almost ten years later, two of the production facilities have been demolished, the third one converted to produce pharmaceuticals, while the declared munitions have been flattened by bulldozers - but only about half the stockpile of chemical agents and precursor chemicals have been destroyed, according to the OPCW.   That makes the proposed mid-2014 deadline for the newly minted Nobel Peace Prize winners to verify the destruction of Syria's chemical arsenal seem ambitious at the very least - the Assad regime is reported to possess about 1,000 tonnes of agents and precursor chemicals. And something else that the Hague-based organization is sure to keep in mind as it tackles the Syria operation is that Gaddafi lied to the OPCW in 2004 and it was only after his downfall that the new government in Tripoli in November 2011 discovered previously undeclared stockpiles.  There's little reason to trust Assad's declarations at this stage - just days before admitting his regime possessed chemical weapons, he denied that it possessed those same weapons. But the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC) includes a mechanism whereby any state party can initiate a challenge inspection if it suspects non-compliance by another member. This is where the UN Security Council comes into play. Resolution 2118, adopted on Sept. 27, states that OPCW inspectors must have "unfettered access to and the right to inspect, in discharging their functions, any and all sites, and by allowing immediate and unfettered access to individuals that the OPCW has grounds to believe to be of importance for the purpose of its mandate." Failure to do so calls for a Chapter VII resolution. It would be beyond credibility for Russia or China to veto a resolution that would call on a state party to honor its treaty commitments.

Lithuania President Dalia Grybauskaite addressing the UN General Assembly on Sept. 26, 2013 (UN Photo/Ryan Brown)

Brazil's President Dilma Rouseff Addresses 2012 General Assembly (UN Photo/Marco Castro) Sept. 23, 2013 -  Only six of the 34 presidents, prime ministers and monarchs that will address the United Nations General Assembly on Tuesday are women. Argentina (Cristina Kirchner), Bangladesh (Sheikh Hasina), Brazil (Dilma Rouseff), Costa Rica (Laura Chinchila), Liberia (Ellen Sirleaf) and Malawi (Joyce Banda) are the countries with female leaders taking the podium on the opening day of the high-level segment. The less than 20 percent ratio of women to men is pretty much average across the board for female participation in politics with women occupying about 18 percent of parliamentary seats worldwide.

Sept. 18, 2013  - Kenya's President Uhuru Kenyatta, who is facing charges of crimes against humanity at the International Criminal Court, is expected in New York next week to speak at the United Nations General Assembly. The latest UN list of speakers for the annual General Debate notes that the head of state will speak on behalf of Kenya's delegation next Wednesday. Kenyatta was indicted by the Hague court in March 2011 charged with crimes including murder, rape and persecution that occurred in 2007-08 following a disputed election. He denies the charges. Kenyatta was elected as Kenya's president in March. President Obama did not visit the country, his ancestral homeland, during his June visit to Africa, traveling instead to Senegal, South Africa and Tanzania. Obama's decision not to visit was reportedly due to Kenyatta's election. Unlike Sudan's President Omar Al Bashir who has refused to appear at the court and is subject to an arrest warrant, Kenyatta has travelled to the Hague to defend himself. Calls to Kenya's UN mission to confirm his attendance were not answered. - Denis Fitzgerald