UN summit made only slim progress on fighting poverty

World leaders adopted modest reforms of the United Nations on Friday after a three-day summit to mark its 60th anniversary that made only slim progress on fighting poverty and terrorism, boosting security and protecting human rights.

Kofi Annan, UN secretary-general, hailed an unprecedented agreement on the international responsibility to intervene to protect civilians from genocide and ethnic cleansing to prevent a repeat of massacres in Rwanda, Bosnia and Kosovo.

Other achievements he cited included the establishment of a peace-building commission to help nations emerging from conflict, and member states’ reaffirmation of goals set by a UN Millennium summit in 2000 to halve poverty by 2015.

Not all leaders were as upbeat as the secretary-general.
Shortly before the 40-page document was adopted, Ali Rodriguez, the Venezuelan foreign minister, denounced negotiating procedures as “grotesque” and said they promoted the interests of the major powers over small and developing nations.
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the new Iranian president, said: “The greatest challenge of our age is the gradual spiritual depravation of human beings, brought about by the distancing of the prevailing order from morality and unity of monotheism.”
Tony Blair, the UK leader, was reportedly incensed at his aggressive tone. The next day, none of the EU3 leaders met him, sending their foreign ministers instead.
Robert Mugabe, the Zimbabwean leader under fire for his catastrophic slum clearances, railed against the “double standards, xenophobia selectivity and self-righteousness” standing in the way of equitable development, and denounced the “vague concepts” of humanitarian intervention “that provide an opportunity for those states that seek to interfere in the internal affairs of other states.”
Aleksandr Lukashenko, president of Belarus, put in a word for the much-misunderstood Soviet model. “The Soviet Union, despite the blunders of its leaders, was the source and hope and support for many states and peoples,” he explained.
Hugo Chavez, the Venezuelan leader, had his own sharp words for world leaders.
“The United Nations must be pulled out of the United States,” he announced. “It is imperative we build a New International Political Order. Despite conspiracies, the calumnies of media power and the permanent menace of the empire and its allies – which includes promoting magnicide – the new and thriving Venezuela will build the socialism of the 21st century.”
Of all the showy outbursts at this year’s UN summit, it was a plaintive note penned by George W. Bush, caught by a eagle-eyed Reuters photographer, that many will remember about the summit. In it, the US president asked whether he could go to the bathroom in the middle of a Security Council meeting.
“I think I may need a bathroom break. Is this possible,” he wrote to Condoleezza Rice, the secretary of state.
For the US President, of course it was possible.