“A return to principled action is necessary not only for the sake of the UN’s political relevance and moral authority but more urgently for the sake of the peoples of the world the UN is meant to protect from the vagaries of unprincipled power, MONA ALI KHALIL states.
“Restoring the relevance and credibility of the UN Secretariat therefore requires that UN leaders and staff have conviction in the efficacy of adhering to UN principles and values, as well as the courage to act on that conviction,” she writes in a paper titled ‘Restoring the Values and Spirit of the International Civil Service’, published by the Dag Hammarskjöld Foundation.
At a minimum, KHALIL stresses, the UN Secretariat must undertake three crucial actions going forward:
1. Return to a classical definition of impartiality. Impartiality has come to mean finding the midpoint between the parties to a conflict. As such, the UN has been reduced to pro forma statements condemning the violence and assigning equal responsibility on the parties to end the violence. “Such statements impose a false balance that often belies the scale and multiplicity of the violations of one party over another.”
The UN should not and must not be impartial to the UN Charter or to the rule of law; it must condemn violations of international human rights and humanitarian law objectively – regardless of the political or economic power of the perpetrator. It must condemn aggression, genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity as consistently and as unequivocally as it deplores acts of terrorism. It must name and shame State actors as loudly as it does non-State actors.
2. Uphold integrity as a higher calling. Integrity must be understood as something more than submitting financial disclosure forms and avoiding conflicts of interest. The UN Secretariat must not suffice with meeting minimum competencies but should rather aspire to the highest standards of competence. It must reimagine the international civil servant not as a matter of earning salaries and emoluments but rather as a calling to serve the objects and purposes of the United Nations.
No one should have any illusions about the difficulty of speaking truth to power, but there should be greater difficulty in counting the dead and injured when the UN Secretariat fails to do so out of political expediency. “The UN Secretariat must therefore be the first to demand criminal accountability for those who harm civilians – especially those it has itself deployed when they become the perpetrators of harm against those they are deployed to protect.”
3. Protect the independence of the UN Secretariat. The voices of those who speak truth to power or stand up to oppression – especially those entrusted with human rights or other rule of law mandates – should be protected by the organization and its Secretary-General – every day and in every way. “Too often, the record shows that such voices are muted or even mooted – by both external pressures and internal forces. They are branded as idealistic or worse yet as unrealistic – as if surrendering the Secretariat’s only power, its moral authority, is somehow more practical or pragmatic.”
The UN Secretary-General must also speak out loudly and stand up strongly; while he (and someday she) cannot force the Security Council to act, he can and should fully exercise his authority, under Article 99 of the UN Charter, to remind the Security Council of its duty to take prompt and effective action to resolve conflicts – not just to manage them. He must put forth clear and concrete recommendations to end impunity for violations of international humanitarian and human rights law.
“In conclusion, the UN Secretariat must be more willing to get on the proverbial high horse especially when the grass is getting trampled by elephants,” KHALIL states. It should neither invite nor shy away from controversy. It must remain focused on the fulfilment of its mandates and driven by ‘respect for the law and respect for the truth’.
It should do so knowing in full confidence that if such values and attitudes were to drive any international civil servant ‘into positions of conflict with this or that interest’, as Dag Hammarskjöld wisely forewarned, then ‘that conflict is a sign of his neutrality and not of his failure to observe neutrality – then it is in line, not in conflict with, his duties as an international civil servant’.
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