Posts Tagged ‘UN’

As a Public Affairs Consultant it has struck me as very odd that the Copenhagen Conference - set to begin in under a month - has no confirmed attendees. The UN announced over the weekend that they had assurances from 40 heads of state, but formally no-one is set to attend, which is merely fuelling speculation that the event will be a flop. When organising events for clients it is essential to get the messaging right before the event: it is key to have a good bill of attendees lined up and to put time into strategic promotion of the event. If an event is organised with assurances rather than confirmed attendance and there is a raft of negative media coverage then, suffice to say, it is bound to bomb.

Why is it then that the Copenhagen Climate Change Conference has fallen down this route? It may be that negotiations over what the conference will actually achieve are still ongoing. But even taking this into account there has been a severe lack of strategic organisation around the attendee list. Surely the UN still desperately wants world leaders to meet at Copenhagen, even if proposals are weaker than hoped for.

Firstly, organisers should have invited delegates months ago, the formal invitations should have gone out in the summer and the haggling over attendance should have taken place several months ago. Having left this element to the 11^th hour, there is a chance that at the last minute all goes to plan; but the conference has been tarnished by two months of speculation about the attendees. Still no formal invitations have been sent and so the press have no stories to run except intrigue about who might not attend and how the conference is breaking down.

Secondly, why is it that there has been such a breakdown between Barack Obama and the organisers? There have been rumours swirling for weeks that he may not attend. He has not come out and dispelled this myth and nor have any officials from the conference. Surely both Obama and the conference organisers realise how damaging this has been for the conference. Since September the image of the conference has changed from a landmark event to solve the biggest problem facing the planet to just another global conference, already destined to fail. Why have Obama’s spokespeople and the conference spokespeople not put up a united front in their messaging? Instead there has been division, which has made Obama, who has put tackling climate change at the centre of his promises, seem hypocritical and has made the conference seem impotent.

It is a tragic failure that a fantastic event such as the Copenhagen conference seems to have fallen because of communications failings. Even though there may still be successful resolutions coming out of Copenhagen, I think the negotiations will be all the harder with such an intense media glare waiting for the conference to fail. In fact this negative pre-conference atmosphere might scupper this magnificent opportunity for global dialogue on climate change and cast Copenhagen into the vast pile of what if? moments in history.

Let me know what you think. Should the UN have tried harder to commit world leaders to attend Copenhagen?

At 1.06 am on Monday morning the British Geological Survey stations in Herefordshire, Aberdeen and Devon suddenly began registering a tremor at magnitude five on the Richter scale. These tremors did not occur along a fault line and did not have the complex mix of P-waves and shear waves that are the tell-tale sign of an earthquake. Instead the tremors seemed to be caused by an explosion, which had its epicentre in the county of Kilju, deep in the mountains of north-eastern North Korea - the home of the P’unggye-yok nuclear test site.

South Korea stated immediately that these readings were probably caused by an underground atomic explosion by the North Koreans - an explosion the size of Hiroshima.

Suddenly Douglas Hogg’s moat; Jacqui Smith’s adult films and Damian McBride’s puerile emails, which have ruled the media in the last 2 months, are thrown into relief as the world is plunged into a serious, deep crisis. It is one of those challenges like the Bosnian war, the Suez Crisis and the Rwandan Genocide where you cannot help thinking that the UN looks feeble. Realistically what can the UN do to stop North Korea’s nuclear ambitions? They have the power of sanctions and the threat of isolation for the aggressor nation. For the UK during the Suez Crisis of 1956 these measures were enough to force the UK to back down over its intervention in Egypt. These measures designed and condoned by the US, Europe and the UK are effective against similar countries because they all want to be at the centre of the western world and genuinely fear being cast out by the international community.

But, for nations outside the western world, with a history of antagonism towards Europe and the US - do sanctions or the fear of UN condemnation court influence? I say no. North Korea has strong links with China and Russia - the two megaliths of Asia. With these alliances Kim Jong-Il can laugh in the face of UN pressure, as he has the support of two of the largest energy producers manufacturers and exporters in the world and permanent members of the UN Security Council. Also, which countries around the world would really stand in North Korea’s way if they further developed their nuclear ambitions? It is clear that despite having nuclear capability and strong armed forces the UK would do almost anything rather than use force against North Korea, because as Iraq and Vietnam show - foreign wars lose popularity very quickly. The world’s policing system, therefore, is almost solely confined to diplomatic measures.

In the last 5 years this crisis has developed and has shown the world’s inability to stop North Korea’s march towards developing a nuclear arsenal. In 2004 North Korea carried out its first nuclear test; in 2007 under multilateral pressure North Korea agreed to shut down its leading uranium enrichment site, but in April 2009 it seems these promises were empty as they fired a multistage rocket and vowed to start up the site once again. A month later and this latest nuclear test is recorded.

This is a dangerous situation - even more so since it must be asked why is North Korea absolutely determined to develop nuclear weapons? Are they really prepared to fire or is it, as one commentator suggested, just a means of making President Obama stand to attention. I hope it is political manoeuvring because for anyone who has read Nevil Shute’s On The Beach - the thought that North Korea might actually use its nuclear technology harbours up images of ghost towns, tumble weeds and nuclear fallout on a worldwide scale.

Hopefully the North Koreans are aware of the stake as well, because as has always been the case the principle of Mutually Assured Destruction is the best mean of ensuring nuclear safety. Hopefully Kim Jong-Il is aware and afraid of the nuclear backlash if he ever uses nuclear weapons. But that is a leap of faith and since it is evident that the western world can do little to stop the North Koreans if they have their mind set on gaining and using nuclear weapons the situation is suite terrifying, when you think about it. It seems like 20 years since the Berlin Wall fell we still have to place all of our faith in North Korea not using its technology. Personally relying on Mutually Assured Destruction, knowing that the West is powerless to do much more, is not particularly reassuring.