Workers World Sept. 21, 2000: At UN summit, powerful words and empty promises

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------------------------- Via Workers World News Service Reprinted from the Sept. 21, 2000 issue of Workers World newspaper -------------------------

UN MILLENNIUM SUMMIT

Powerful words, empty promises

By Greg Butterfield

New York

Poverty and inequality. Racism and injustice. War and oppression. These issues are addressed every week in this newspaper. They touch the lives of all working-class and oppressed people on the planet.

They were also among the subjects of the Sept. 6-8 United Nations Millennium Summit in New York hosted by U.S. President Bill Clinton and of the "Millennium Declaration" adopted by 149 heads of states and national leaders at the meeting's close.
Listen to the declaration's words:
"The world leaders pledged to establish a just and lasting peace all over the world in accordance with the objectives and principles of the [UN] charter, and reaffirmed to support all efforts to uphold the sovereign equality of all states, respect for their territorial integrity and political independence, and resolution of disputes by peaceful means in conformity with the principles of justice and international law."
The declaration continues: "They also reaffirmed to support the right of self-determination of people which remain under colonial domination and foreign occupation, non-interference in the internal affairs of states, respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms, respect for the equal right of all without distinction to race, sex, language or religion."
The UN members pledged themselves to, among other things, halve the number of people living on less than $1 a day by 2015; eradicate AIDS and other diseases ravaging the developing world, especially Africa; and "ensure that globalization becomes a positive force for all the world's people."
It all sounds wonderful, doesn't it?
Yet, despite the hopes of the world's people and even of many presidents and prime ministers of Third World nations at the summit, the pledge has little substance. It is not in the interests of the imperialist powers that dominate the UN--the United States, Britain, France and others--to fulfill these hallowed pledges.
For them, the Millennium Summit was a good photo-op, nothing more.
Did the U.S. president, for example, take seriously the pledge he signed against colonialism, when the United States continues to occupy Puerto Rico, Guam and other lands as it has for the past century?
What about the vow against foreign occupation? There are 37,000 U.S. troops in south Korea, keeping it separated from the north--and they were put there by a 1950 UN "police action," no less.
This hypocrisy was apparent to the leaders of many oppressed countries and peoples who made their feelings known at the meeting, like President Thabo Mbeki of South Africa.
"The poor of the world stand at the gates of comfortable mansions occupied by each and every king and queen, president, prime minister and minister privileged to attend this unique meeting," Mbeki told the delegates. "The question these billions ask is--what are you doing, you in whom we have placed our trust, what are you doing to end the deliberate and savage violence against us that every day sentences many of us to a degrading and unnecessary death?
"Those who stand at the gates are desperately hungry for food, for no fault of their own. They die from preventable diseases for no fault of their own.
"Part of the naked truth," Mbeki continued, "is that the second millennium provided humanity with the capital, the technology and the human skills to end poverty and underdevelopment throughout the world. Another part of that truth is that we have refused to use this enormous capacity to end the contemporary, deliberate and savage violence of poverty and underdevelopment.
"Our collective rhetoric conveys promise," the South African president concluded. "The offense is that our actions communicate the message that, in reality, we do not care. We are indifferent. Our actions say the poor must bury the poor." (ANC Web site)
Torn by contradictions
Since its creation in 1945 the United Nations has been a body torn by internal contradictions. Its charter, declaring peace, prosperity and the brotherhood and sisterhood of nations, echoes the Great French Revolution of 1789. But it has never amounted to more than words on paper.
Why? Because the UN attempts to contain within itself irreconcilable forces: oppressing and oppressed nations, bourgeois and workers' states.
Inevitably, inexorably, the UN became the tool of the imperialist nations that founded it at the end of World War II.
Take, for example, President Clinton's main intervention at the summit. He, too, said the UN must "confront the iron link between deprivation, disease and war."
But how does he propose to do this? By creating a rapid-fire military force at the command of the U.S.-dominated UN Security Council. "They need to be able to be peacekeepers who can be rapidly deployed, properly trained and equipped, able to project credible force," Clinton said.
The contradiction is most explicitly demonstrated by the dichotomy between the Security Council, dominated by the U.S., Britain and France, and the General Assembly, where oppressed nations constitute the majority. Through arm-twisting, bribery, sheer economic might and their veto power, the imperialists on the Security Council dominate political and economic matters. The General Assembly and the UN's affiliated organizations, while often critical of the Security Council, have no power.
One way that Washington dominates, many leaders said, is by withholding $1.8 billion in back dues that could help the UN's underfunded health, nutrition and social services programs for poor countries.
Cuban President Fidel Castro voiced the anger of many UN members when he said, "There has not even been any mention of radically reforming this longstanding institution, which came into existence more than 50 years ago when there were only a few independent countries, of converting it into an agency which is truly representative of the interests of the people of the world, without anybody having access to irritating and undemocratic veto power..." (Granma International Web site)
Those countries that have attempted what President Mbeki described--using the technology, wealth and skills of modern industry to build a society that is just and equitable--have been warred against by the United States and other imperialist powers, both within and outside the UN's walls.
It doesn't matter whether it is a country trying to build socialism, like People's China, which Washington prevented for 25 years from taking its rightful seat in the UN, or a nationalist regime like Iraq, which has suffered 1.5 million deaths after 10 years of sanctions imposed by the Security Council.
What happened to "non-interference in the internal affairs of countries"?
At one time, the oppressed countries had more of a voice in the UN, even when the U.S. used it as a blunt instrument of military intervention in Korea and other areas. That was when the socialist USSR--second in military might only to the U.S.--held a seat on the Security Council.
Then, at least, the Palestinians, anti-apartheid movement and Irish liberation forces had a voice--and even won votes in favor of their causes in the General Assembly.
With the destruction of the USSR and the retreat of China from international solidarity, however, the UN became even more a U.S. plaything. Other forums for Third World countries, like the Non-Aligned Movement, became easier for the imperialist powers to ignore.
Still, with so few opportunities to have a voice in international affairs, the leaders of many countries--especially the remaining socialist states and those headed by governments growing out of national-liberation movements--struggled to be heard in New York.
Their message is an important one for the working-class, progressive and anti-imperialist movement in the United States to hear.
Leaders speak
Vietnam President Tran Duc Luong said addressing poverty and narrowing the gap between rich and poor nations should be the UN's top priority in the 21st century. He called for "economic and commercial cooperation on the basis of equality, non-discrimination and satisfactory assistance and preference to poor countries." (Vietnam News, Sept. 10)
Iraqi Deputy Prime Minister Tariq Aziz denounced the efforts of some Security Council members to put a human face on a brutal policy with their rhetoric of "better targeting sanctions" to ease civilian suffering.
"[Sanctions'] use should be restricted," Aziz said, adding, "They should not be held hostage to the will of the United States of America, which hijacked the resolution on the lifting of sanctions on Iraq [in December 1999] from the Security Council to exploit it in the service of its own interests and hostile policies." (Associated Press, Sept. 7)
Libyan Foreign Minister Abdurrahman Shalghem agreed, calling sanctions "terrorist." His country, like Iraq, has been targeted by the United States for brutal economic blockade because his government defied U.S. hegemony in the Middle East and Northern Africa.
Shalghem offered a very different definition of terrorism from the one used by the U.S. to demonize those who defy Wall Street's dictates. Shalghem said terrorism is "sanctions, resorting to brutal force, the threat of such force, conditions laid down by the World Bank, International Monetary Fund and World Trade Organization, nuclear arms and weapons of mass destruction."
Shalghem called for the imperialist powers to pay reparations to their former colonies "for the persecution inflicted upon them, the destruction caused to their environment, and for their resources and cultural properties that have been plundered." (Reuters, Sept. 9)
Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez joined in calling for an end to the blockades against Iraq, Cuba and other countries. He also slammed Washington's growing military intervention in Colombia's civil war.
"The only solution for Colombia is peace. Sending helicopter gunships to Colombia will not achieve peace," Chavez said. (Times of India, Sept. 9)
Challenging U.S. and British efforts to demonize him for supporting landless Black workers' expropriations of white landowners' farms, Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe told a Harlem meeting Sept. 7, "We will not go back.
"If the new millennium, like the last, remains an age of hegemonic empires and conquerors doing the same old things in new technological ways, remains the age of the master race, the master economy and the master state, then I am afraid we in developing countries will have to stand up as a matter of principle and say, 'Not again.'"
President Castro was also blunt.
"The 30 developed and wealthy nations which have the monopoly over economic, technological and political power are meeting here with us to offer us more of the same prescriptions that have only served to make us steadily poorer, more exploited and more dependent.
"There is nothing in the existing economic and political order that can serve the interests of humankind," Castro said. "Thus, it is unsustainable and it must be changed." (Granma International Web site)
Castro, the leader of a small, poor, blockaded island nation, was one of the few heads of state to offer a substantial proposal. He offered the UN's World Health Organization up to 3,000 Cuban doctors to go to sub-Saharan Africa and help impoverished and exploited countries train medical personnel and create a health care infrastructure. He challenged the European powers to provide AIDS medicines to those countries at low cost.

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