SUNS4503 Monday 6 September 1999

Latin America: Civil Society urges reformulation of UN

Santiago, Sep 2 (IPS/Gustavo Gonz lez) -- A regional forum of representatives of civil society from throughout Latin America stressed in Chile the need to bring the United Nations system into line with the realities of today's post-Cold War, globalised world, to enable the international body to meet the challenges of
the new millennium.

The two-day Regional Consultation with Civil Society, held in the Santiago headquarters of the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), ended Thursday.

UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan entrusted Under-Secretary-General Miles Toby with the task of organising regional consultations on issues like human rights, armed conflicts, the environment and sustainable development prior to the "millennium summit" to be held in September 2000 in New York.

Regional consultations have already been held in Beirut for Asia, Addis Ababa for Africa, and Geneva for Europe. The Asia-Pacific gathering will be held in Tokyo later this month, and a North American meeting will take place in November.

Chilean Foreign Minister Juan Gabriel Vald‚s, who inaugurated the meeting, stressed that the world that gave birth to the United Nations five decades ago was very different from today's world, where states must now share with other actors the virtual monopoly on power they enjoyed in the past.

Equality between states is a utopia that the United Nations failed to achieve, he pointed out. Meanwhile, other hegemonies are taking shape, like that of transnational corporations, a consequence of the expansion of capital and markets within the process of globalisation.

Participants heard reports on human rights, conflicts and peace processes in the region, the environment, sustainable development, and development with equity.

[According to an ECLAC press release, in a session on the role of the UN in protection of environment and promoting sustainable development, participants questioned the sustainability of the current predominant model of production and consumption, describing it as "irrational and wasteful."

[According to the press release, speakers at the panel discussion, moderated by Ramiro Tellez of the Central American Association of Peasant Organizations for Cooperation and Development (ASOCODE), agreed that the deterioration of the planet's ecosystems is one of the greatest dangers for the future of humanity. In this respect, they said, the UN's role in the coming century should be to open up spaces for creation of a new model of sustainable development, in which the drive to dominate nature is replaced by the recognition of inter-dependence with nature.

[The gap between rich and poor countries was seen as a further factor damaging the world's ecology and permitting unbalanced exploitation of natural resources. [Participants recognized the contribution of the UN towards creating awareness of the environment and need for sustainable development. The UN, they said, should forcefully advocate the rights of indigenous peoples, and establish a permanent forum guaranteeing greater participation and visibility for indigenous organizations.

[The United Nations, participants said, should establish more equal relations with NGOs by overcoming the donor-recipient model, facilitate South-South exchanges and increase awareness of its successful programmes.]

The conflict in Colombia was one of the central focuses of a panel on "the role of the United Nations in protecting and promoting human rights in the next century."

Former Colombian foreign minister Mar¡a Emma Mej¡a stressed that the number of people displaced by the violence in her country was four times the total displaced in Kosovo, while 5,000 lives - the total number lost during the conflict in Northern Ireland - were claimed every six months.

Mej¡a said Colombia could be seen as a sort of testing-ground for the United Nations with respect to the new challenges it faces today.

Ronalth Ochaeta, with the Inter-American Human Rights Institute, pointed out that Colombian society was caught in the crossfire between four main groups: the guerrillas, the army, paramilitary units and drug traffickers.

He maintained that external military intervention in Colombia must be ruled out, as it would only cause greater damages, and suggested that the UN Security Council seek effective mechanisms to deal with internal conflicts.

Mej¡a said the shortcomings of a 50-year-old international system in dealing with the conflicts seen today and applying international human rights law were reflected in her country.

The United Nations was conceived of to prevent conflicts between states, she underlined. But 95 of the 101 conflicts that have broken out since 1980 have been internal, while only six were international in nature.

Prevention mechanisms are ineffective in warding off internal conflicts, which she described as increasingly silent and deadly, that become news only once they reach tragic extremes.

In his speech, Foreign Minister Vald‚s warned of a global crisis of governability, with states and governments less effective today, while "multiple levels of overlapping authority are emerging.

"While the United Nations was created by states and continues to be seen as their instrument, it is clear that the organisation has moved beyond its inter-governmental character on a number of occasions.

"The idea that the United Nations can only do what its members are willing to do is not so true today," the minister maintained. "The UN has not always subordinated itself to the principle of sovereignty, and has not always acted with the consent of the states affected by its actions."

The world body has developed "very complex, although not necessarily efficient, practices and machinery to undertake political, economic, social and humanitarian actions in a broad range of areas," he added.

Valdes mentioned "a powerful tension" between the principle of non-interference in internal affairs of states, and the circumstances that fuel such interventions - a tension "that is being resolved in favour of interference."

The minister mentioned recent international conflicts in "Africa and Latin America or the Balkan war."

"Genocide and massive human rights violations are destined to become the business of international courts," a tendency that is backed by the Chilean government, he added.

In an implicit allusion to last year's arrest of former dictator Augusto Pinochet - who ruled Chile from 1973 to 1990 - in London and his possible extradition and trial in Spain, the minister said "we must advance towards a clear, orderly and non- discriminatory" international regime of justice.

But in this "transitional stage of the process of the globalisation of justice," jurisdictional standards "are not
clear, and are submitted to varying interpretations, including the most arbitrary and absurd, and to unilateral conduct and practices." The Chilean government, which last year signed the statute for the creation of an International Criminal Court, has invoked the principle of the non-extraterritorial reach of justice to argue
against Pinochet being tried in a third country.

ECLAC Executive Secretary Jos‚ Antonio Ocampo underlined that the UN's relations with civil society had been strengthened, with more emphasis on the fields of humanitarian assistance and promotion and protection of human rights. He added that while emergency situations led the UN to focus on the defence of civil
and political rights, the economic, social and cultural aspects of human rights were now taking on a growing and increasingly pressing significance.