A possible peace deal in the pipeline as the Dinkas and Murles in Jonglei, South Sudan, agree to end age-old hostilities, March 28, 2019. The US is withholding its agreed-on share of UN peacekeeping dues that go to such missions as the one in South Sudan. UNMISS/UN PHOTO
A wave of new or persistent accusations of harassment and corruption in some UN system agencies and programs reflects poor management and more politicization of high-level appointments demanded by UN member nations. Here, the UN headquarters.
In a refugee camp in South Sudan, people escape the fighting in the country’s civil war, including rampant rape by militias and national armed forces. Members of the UN Security Council are drafting a resolution to strengthen such victims’ rights, but the United States is refusing language on sexual and reproductive health services. GEOFF PUGH
In a refugee camp in South Sudan, people escape the fighting in the country’s civil war, including rampant rape by militias and national armed forces. Members of the UN Security Council are drafting a resolution to strengthen victims’ rights, but the United States is resisting language on sexual and reproductive health services. GEOFF PUGH
Hasmik Egian, center, director of the Security Council Affairs Division of the UN, receiving requests from diplomats who want to speak at the emergency Council session on Venezuela, Jan. 26, 2019. MANUEL ELIAS/UN PHOTO
Jockeying for a two-year seat on the United Nations Security Council starts early — way early. Three countries are already vying for the two open seats in the regional group known as Weog — Western Europe and Others — for the 2021-22 term. The election is June 2020, and the “others” are Australia, Canada, Israel and New Zealand.
Ana Menéndez, a former Spanish diplomat, leads the UN’s internal gender parity strategy and oversees the institution’s policymaking. In an interview with PassBlue, she said that the UN stands for certain “values,” and an integral part of those beliefs is gender equality. Here, she attends a UN Commission on the Status of Women meeting, March 2019. AMANDA VOISARD/UN WOMEN
In Dakar, staff members from UN Women Senegal and other UN agencies attend a presentation on sexual harassment in the workplace, part of the International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women, 2016.
As multilateralism takes a beating from President Trump amid the “new world disorder,” as one European diplomat put it, three women who know the United Nations inside and out through previous top leadership jobs have originated a Group of Women Leaders for Change and Inclusion.
United Nations Secretary-General Dag Hammarskjöld, left, was the guest of honor at an official reception in Leopoldville (now Kinshasa), Congo, on Sept. 13, 1961, with Cyrille Adoula, the head of the country, right, and his deputy, Antoine Gizenga (with glasses). Five days later, the secretary-general, the author’s father and others were dead in a mysterious plane crash in the region. UN PHOTO
My clock radio clicked on. The morning news bulletin announced that United Nations Secretary-General Dag Hammarskjöld’s plane was missing.
It was Sept. 18, 1961. I was 16.
Achim Steiner, center, is a longtime specialist who now runs the UN Development Program, based in New York. The current restructuring of the UN may be sidelining Steiner, jeopardizing development work.
As the first effects of Secretary-General António Guterres’s ambitious organizational reform plans become apparent, former and current officials of the United Nations Development Program see the future of the internationally influential agency as uncertain if not in peril.
