UN at 80: a Mixed Legacy of Highs and Lows : Shared by Niloufar Pourzand

 UN at 80: a Mixed Legacy of Highs and Lows

By Thalif Deen
IPS News
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Summary
As the UN commemorates its 80th anniversary with a high-level meeting of 138 world leaders, critics and supporters reflect on its mixed record. The UN has often failed in its primary mission of maintaining peace and security—highlighted by wars in Iraq and Ukraine, U.S. vetoes of Gaza ceasefire resolutions, and the unresolved status of Western Sahara. Yet, it has excelled as a global relief organization, leading humanitarian aid through agencies like WFP, WHO, UNICEF, and UNHCR. Experts warn of declining effectiveness, internal divisions, and increasing attacks from powerful member states, even as others stress the UN’s indispensability in peacebuilding, poverty reduction, climate action, and digital governance. Calls for urgent reform dominate the anniversary, with leaders urged to revive multilateralism in an era of multiple global crises.

Quotes

• Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy: “Where is the peace that the United Nations was created to guarantee? And where is the security that the Security Council was supposed to guarantee?”

• Dr. Stephen Zunes: “I have never been more pessimistic… Things have steadily gotten worse since the end of the Cold War.”

• Dr. Richard J. Ponzio: The UN “has demonstrated time and again its indispensability in the areas of peacebuilding, fighting extreme poverty, and increasingly in climate action and digital governance too.”

• Felix Dodds: “Working together, we will build a more just, equitable and sustainable world for not only us but for future generations.”

• Amitabh Behar, Oxfam International: “At its 80th anniversary, governments have a unique and urgent opportunity to lay the foundation for the reform direly needed to strengthen the UN… In spite of it all, we must remember the power of collective action.”

• Annalena Baerbock, President of the General Assembly: The Charter was “a pledge — not to deliver us to heaven — but to never again be dragged into hell by the forces of hatred and unchecked ambition.”

• International Crisis Group: “While those were bruising eras, the organisation’s members managed to rally, reconcile and institute important reforms… It is not clear they will be able or indeed want to do so this time.”