CUUNA invites you to a free, upcoming talk with Sir Jeremy Greenstock!

See the details below or at our Facebook event page.

Who: Sir Jeremy Greenstock, former UK ambassador to the United Nations and chairman of the UNA-UK board of directors
What: A talk entitled “Is the UN Still Relevant in a Networked World?”
When: 10:30 am, Saturday, 11 February 2012
Where: The Stone Yard Centre, St. Andrews Street Baptist Church (across from Emmanuel College)

Dear all,

If you want to go on a trip to Geneva and see the UN Office there, READ ON! I am sure one of the main reasons for you joining CUUNA is to know more about how the UN works and to physically see their working environment. The trip to Geneva is the perfect chance for just that, and a LOT MORE, e.g. exploring the beautiful Geneva, meeting new friends, “practicing French?” and so on. In fact one of the best things is that you are very like to get hold of some very useful contacts. From past experience, several members even managed securing an internship, knowing who to contact and so on.

The trip will begin shortly after the Lent term finishes, starting from the 18th-21st March. During that period of time, you will have the chance to meet officers from the UNIDR, ICRC, UNHCR, WHO, WTO and many others.

Roughly speaking, the cost of the trip is going to be around 190 pounds, including accommodation & breakfast and guided tour within the UN Offices. Flights are however not included. Please note that there is the possibility of the cost going down. For those going onto the trip, you will also get a FREE CUUNA hoodie!!

That’s the basics about the trip, but if you want to find out more, you should definitely turn up to our information session/ presentation. We will send out information about venue and timing in due course, but the preliminary date for the session is Thursday, 9th February.

I look forward to seeing many of you there.

Have a nice week,

Vincent Yeung

Vice Chair, CUUNA

After a productive meeting on Friday, please welcome your CUUNA/MUN committee for 2012:

President: Isabel Eichwede

Vice-President: Owain Richards

Secretary-General: Debayan Dasgupta

Treasurer: Joel Moss

Publicity Officer: Boaz Sobrado

Events Officer: Johnathan Zemlik

Debating Officer: Ingram Davidson

20th January, 7pm: As discussed last term, we will be merging with the CU Model United Nations this term to form a larger and more varied society focuced on the UN. This will be a meeting allowing us to explain all the new roles availible and the new constitution.

27 January, 7pm: ELECTIONS. The roles available are numerous, so there’s a spot for everyone!  President, Vice-P, Treasurer, Secretary-General, Campaigns Officer, Publicity Officer, Debating Officer, Media Officer, Events Officer. There will also be a dozen of appointed positions

Please send a short manifesto by Monday 23 January – hustings will take place on the day.

11 February, 10:30am- There will be a talk from the Chairman of the UK United Nations Association, Sir Jeremy Greenstock, on ‘Is the UN still relevant to a networked world?’. The talk will discus the role of the UN in a changing global enviroment, which promises to be very exciting!

Date: Mon 14 Nov (7:30-8:30pm)
Venue: Munby Room, King’s College

CUUNA will be hosting a drinks reception after the UN event at the Careers Centre with:

• John Ericson (Head of Outreach, UN Secretarait, New York)
• Lauren Canning (Human Resources Specialist, UNDP)
• Steve Allen (Regional Director for Central and Eastern Europe and the Commonwealth of Independent States, UNICEF)

It will be a great chance to ask any questions and a valuable networking opportunity.

We look forward to seeing many of you there!

Senior Human Resources staff from various UN agencies will brief you on working for the UN – the variety of roles on offer; the type of people they need; the application process and the nationality-specific competitive exams.

***

DRAFT PROGRAMME

3.15pm Babbage lecture room doors open

3.30-4.30pm Working for the UN – John Ericson, Head of Outreach, UN Secretariat, New York

4.45-5.45 Working for UNDP, Lauren Canning, Human Resources Specialist, UNDP

6-7pm Working for UNICEF, Steven Allen, Regional Director for Central and Eastern Europe and the Commonwealth of Independent States, UNICEF.

***

You will need to book a place for any above sessions you wish to attend as this session was oversubscribed last year.

All students are advised to attend the main briefing at 3.30pm even if their particular interest is in UNDP or UNICEF, but you need to book separately for each session.

For BOOKINGS click here

You can get involved by becoming a CUUNA College Rep. College Reps are at the heart of the CUUNA team. They assist the Campaigns Officer with the termly campaigns as well as helping with publicity, i.e putting up posters. It is a great way to get involved with the decision making process without a large time commitment. Please email jc631@cam.ac.uk if you are interested or would like more details.

CUUNA will be holding an emergency general meeting on the 8th November at 6pm in the Munby Room at King’s College.

The positions that are open for nomination are:

Campaigns Officer

Deputy Campaigns Officer

Treasurer

Social Secretary

Web Officer

Publicity Officer & Editor

For further details about what the roles entail please see the constitution.

If you are thinking for running for committee positions,  please send a manifesto (between 1/2- 1 page of A4) to lec50@cam.ac.uk by 12pm on Monday 7th November.

Even if you do not wish to run for a position, please come along to the meeting to vote for potential candidates and raise any issues that you may have. We will also be discussing the new merger with the MUN society and explaining how the new structure will function.

Please note that committee positions and College Rep positions are only available to members

We encourage you to visit our stand to learn more about CUUNA and to become a member of one of the largest Cambridge University Societies. We are recruiting CUUNA College Representatives and we are promoting our annual Geneva Trip to the European UN headquarters. This is an exciting opportunity for students of Cambridge University to become actively involved in promoting the Millennium Goals within Cambridge University and throughout the local community.

Event: CUUNA Freshers’ Squash
Date: Tues 18 Oct (5:30pm)
Venue: Party Room (under the bar), Downing College

The UN and Humanitarian Intervention in the 21st Century

By Glenn Edwards

Anti-Gaddafi Protest in San Francisco's UN Plaza, February 2011 (Credit: Euan Slorach)

Although Colonel Gaddafi’s fist remains clenched over the Libyan government and human rights remain trampled underfoot, the age-old historical question ‘What is to be done?’ has finally been answered.

On Thursday 17^th March the United Nations issued resolution 1973. This has allowed for a no-fly zone to be established over Libya as well as a series of air strikes to be deployed against the Gaddafi regime. Notice that it is no mere coincidence here that humanitarianism has managed to hijack the language of policy makers. In the Commons debate preceding the resolution, Cameron made the people of Libya his central theme, claiming: “The world has watched as [Gaddafi] has brutally crushed his own people.” On the other side of the Atlantic, Obama has declared that he is in “support of an international effort to protect Libyan civilians.”

Although the United Nations Security Council does not possess a particularly impressive record of interventionism, it is no surprise that it has been endorsed as the solution to the Libyan problem. It is by far the international community’s best hope for bringing peace to this conflict. Since the end of the Cold War the Security Council has risen to a new prominence in a world no longer frozen in international deadlock by the ideologically opposed Soviet Union and United States. Some academics have described this as the new ‘renaissance’ of the United Nations.

Without a doubt, the most important development here has been the infiltration of humanitarian doctrine into international law and action. The 1990s witnessed increasingly ambitious attempts to save strangers across the globe from the perils of human rights violations, from famine in Somalia to ethnic cleansing in Kosovo. The aim of international peace and stability suffered continual conflation with humanitarian objectives, but soon it appeared more and more clearly that humanitarianism was fostering a life of its own. At the end of the decade, Kosovo was more of a ‘humanitarian war’ than that of international peace, while guilt still hangs heavily above the heads of the great powers who let blood be spilt in the Rwandan genocide. That, in any case, was clearly a situation which desperately needed active intervention on behalf of the United Nations.

But while humanitarian interventionism was born in the 1990s, the first decade of the 21st century would become its true home. The turn of the century brought with it the brutal events of 9/11 and this precipitated the United Nations resolution, The Responsibility to Protect, more commonly referred to simply as ‘R2P’, in December of that year. This asserts that if a state does not protect the human rights of its citizens, as for example in cases of genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing, and crimes against humanity, there emerges an international responsibility to respond with humanitarian intervention, regardless of the relevant government’s sovereign legitimacy to rule.

This landmark development has become popular in policy-making circles, as demonstrated clearly by the United Nations world summit of 2005. Here the principles of R2P were confirmed in a resounding consensus: a government’s claim to sovereign and legitimate rule is no longer sacrosanct, and any failure to protect the rights of its citizens justifies intervention. Action has been united with principle here where, even after the disastrous occupation of Iraq – somewhat justified by the protection of human rights – humanitarian missions on behalf of the United Nations have persisted. Examples include its action in Liberia in 2003 and its joint action with the European Union for the intervention in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Still, it is easy to get carried away in humanitarian fervour, and admittedly this recent development has not been without its critics. Intervention of any kind retains a sinister reputation in international relations and, often for good reasons, many weaker states are more reluctant to take hold of the helping hand. The thought of 19th century colonial imperialism, along with the strategic intervention and control by the superpowers during the Cold War, remains all too vivid in the minds of states, especially those that wish to preserve their right to rule.

One will always ask the question ‘What’s in it for you?’ when such lengths are made to help. Unfortunately such paranoid suspicions were confirmed with the course of the Anglo-American led occupation in Iraq, since many have detected a wide plethora of ulterior motives including the most notorious example of the hunt for cheap oil reserves and a reinvigorated military presence for the United States in the Middle East. With regards to Libya, the most ferocious critique has come from the World Socialist Website, claiming that the recent resolution ‘has nothing to do with the humanitarian pretexts offered up by the major powers. Rather, it represents the violent imperialist subjugation of a former colony.’ International law is all well and good when everyone plays fair, but it can easily be manipulated to the motives of the shrewd player.

Add to this the fact that many great powers still cherish the principle of sovereign rule, and one notices the threat of a rupture in the unity of the international community. Support for humanitarianism in the United Nations Security Council is certainly not a given. Amongst the permanent five, China and Russia have continually expressed concern and unwillingness to embark on the bandwagon of human rights protection, and have made their reluctance to pursue radical action very clear by abstaining for resolution 1973 (along with Germany, Brazil, and India).

Despite such limitations, the United Nations should strive to assert itself as the champion of international human rights and global solidarity. Much progress has been made in developing a humanitarian voice in international law, and it is about time that a formal amendment was made to the outdated Charter of 1945 in order to accommodate faster and more decisive action. True, Chapter VII once again has allowed for intervention on the basis that the Security Council can determine ‘any threat to the peace’, but this is ambiguous and when the concept of humanitarianism emerges, confusion and diplomatic chaos always ensues. The world is vastly changing in new and frightening ways that threaten the well-being of populations across the globe, changes that hold a worse hand than the great powers of the international community.

Gone are the days of international power politics. Instead, we are witnessing an era of ‘new wars’ as nations have deteriorated in civil war and regional/racial conflict, tyrants have terrorised their people through policies of ethnic cleansing, and famine and poverty remain an increasing threat to the global order. We cannot simply pursue a policy of laissez-faire and let the United Nations become a global bystander to gross atrocities. Standing peace-keeping forces need to be at the ready for the sporadic and unprecedented threats the world will continue to face, while a central intelligence, rather like an MI6 of the United Nations, is needed to co-ordinate and co-operate with sources of intelligence on the ground like NGOs and regional authorities.

Critics of UN intervention may be right to point out that we can never fully prepare for the challenges that await us and ulterior political motives will always remain a factor. But the world will not forget, and will certainly not forgive, if something is not done to prevent global catastrophe. Just because many interventions of the past have ended in disaster does not mean we should give up so easily. The UN must refine and develop its peace-keeping techniques, its variety of methods and sophistication of implementation.

We can only hope that the most recent humanitarian intervention ends in success and proves that human rights are worth fighting for. The spotlight rests firmly on the UN Security Council. Its future could be at stake, along with the lives of ordinary Libyans.

Glenn Edwards is a first-year Politics, Psychology, and Sociology student at Pembroke College.