Utter disappointment!

Feb 19, 2024 Peeping Tom

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Kaieteur News – The world stands on helpless while Israel continues its slaughter of the Palestinians. Even in the face of a provisional ruling by the International Court of Justice (ICJ) demanding that Israel take all measures within its power to prevent the commission of all acts of genocide.

The disappointment over the fact that the ICJ did not order the end to the invasion of Gaza has obscured an important aspect of the court’s ruling. The ICJ did rule (at Article 54) that there were plausible evidence necessitating the need for the Palestinians rights to be protected from genocide. On the eastern front, Ukraine has reached a stalemate in terms of protecting their territory. Just recently, they had to withdraw from a major town in the Donbas region. Closer to home, the political crisis and violence in Haiti has shown no signs of abating. And reports indicated that Venezuela was increasing its military personnel along Guyana’s frontiers.

This is the regional and international context in which Guyana assumed the virtually token Presidency of the UN Security Council for the month of February. Instead of using the opportunity to force a discussion on the aforementioned regional and international hot spots, Guyana opted to launch a signature event on the effects of conflict on food and environmental security.

It was an utter disgrace and betrayal of the solidarity that Guyana has shown for the Palestinian people that Guyana should host such an event at a time when Israel continues to slaughter the poor and helpless Palestinians. It is a neglect of the national interest that the occasion was not used to rally international attention around the need to protect states from the threat of foreign invasion. The United Nations have expounded ad nauseam on the effects of conflict on food security and on the environment. Last May, there was an event at the UN Security Council addressing the relationship between conflict and food security. In 2021, there was an Open Debate on the issue of conflict and food security.

Similarly, the issue of effects of conflict on the environment has been exhaustively highlighted both inside and outside of the Security Council. It is therefore shocking that instead of Guyana using its presidency to push for greater respect for the territorial integrity of states and for reviving the proposal for multinational mission to Haiti, it used its one month Presidency to have a debate on the impact of war and conflict on food and environmental security.

When Guyana assumed its seat on the UN Security Council, it stated that its service would be guided by a people-centered approach, a firm commitment to multilateralism, collective actions and the principles and objectives of the United Nations. It was further stated that Guyana would work collaboratively with all the Council members in addressing the Council’s agenda. Even more astonishing was that Guyana, a country facing a territorial threat, identified five areas will be given special focus: (i) climate change, food insecurity and conflict (ii) peace building and conflict prevention (iii) women, peace and security (iv) protection of children in armed conflicts and (v) youth, peace and security.

As stated before, while the Security Council’s remit does involve non-state conflicts, it is assumed that these issues would be better handled within the organizations and institutions of the UN system such as the Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) which deals with food security and the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCC) deals with climate change matters.

How in the face of what is taking place in Ukraine and in Palestine could Guyana have lost the opportunity to force a debate on what is taking place in these parts of the world and to allow for a greater South perspective on these conflicts?

There are far more important issues relating to global security and in which Guyana has more than a passing national interest that to prioritize the effects of conflict on food and environmental security. As has been said before also in this column, one would have assumed that Guyana’s main focus during its tenure would have been about ensuring greater compliance with international law, including the rejection of threats and aggression. It is in Guyana’s foremost national interest to advocate greater respect and territorial integrity of states.  A signature event on conflict should have been on the more immediate concerns of the ongoing conflicts around the world, including on the situation in Gaza. The United States is always going to block any resolution against Israel.  Russia will not allow any resolution condemning its invasion of Ukraine. But a signature event can be used to have a discussion on these and other conflicts without the need for a formal sitting of the Council.

(The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions and beliefs of this newspaper and its affiliates.)

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• climate change, Convention on Climate Change, Guyana’s frontiers, UN Security Council

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