Pierre Schori Interview: Conversations with History; Institute of International Studies, UC Berkeley
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Does the UN have a role in cleaning up after the elephants, so to speak, in Iraq? I mean, to help put together the institutions and the future of Iraq in the wake of U.S. policy there?
If it is allowed to do it. It's not a role that the UN seeks, to clean up after the elephant. The UN opposed the war and suffered a lot from the attack against its headquarters last summer, but it's also an obligation to assist people in need, the humanitarian aspect. The question is, can the UN and its member states deliver on the humanitarian aspect and support a process under present circumstances? That is the question. And is there a will to allow the UN to do it all the way? We cannot be seen as a cleaning person, doing the mopping up, where there are still other forces under [others'] guidance, and we don't know where they're going.
Is security the big issue now? Not that it is the end-all, but is it the condition for doing the kind of work that the UN might be good at?
Security is, of course, the basic thing. We have experienced over the last year for the first time that the UN is targeted. Not only in Iraq; in Afghanistan, too. This is not the role that the UN should have. The UN must be an independent body, and seen for what it is, an independent body, with no other agenda than to assist people in need. Therefore, there must be no collusion or to be seen working under or very close to the occupying powers. You need a new resolution, you need a new definition, and you need a new acceptance in Iraq for that.
You mentioned Swedish interest in reforming the UN. What do you see as the most pressing reform required for the UN if it's going to assume a whole set of new tasks, which this new era seems to invite?
We must have the legislative means to intervene before a conflict appears, and to act against terrorists and weapons of mass destruction in a more forceful and preventive way -- not preemptive, but preventive -- by diplomatic, civilians measures first. That is the most important question.
The other question is that you need to make the UN, as such, more functional, more modern, internally. You cannot continue in the same way as you did in San Francisco, after San Francisco. Just like in the European Union, you cannot continue with six or ten or fifteen members, when you get twenty-five or more. So there are two different reforms: political reforms and structural reforms. It needs to be done as soon as possible. That's why Kofi Annan appointed this panel of personalities to come up with some draconian solutions, because you cannot achieve it inside the UN. There are so many different wills, and there's a reform group on the Security Council, official and open-ended, where all the nations participate. It has been working for ten years and produced nothing.
What about the Security Council? More members? Different members?
Yes. Everybody accepts that you need to expand it to get more regional representation which corresponds to the membership, but not necessarily to add too many, because you need an efficient Security Council. It's important to get movement in this; it has been a total stalemate.
We have proposed -- as a nation, Sweden -- that you could add five or more non-permanent members, without the veto right. Because this is the question, immediately, that the veto power is the P5, the permanent five. They are not happy to have more who have the veto power. So, let's say, let's add five without the veto power. Then we will see after some years if we can come to a wider reform, if the political context is different. But let's get some movement, it's absolutely necessary.
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