Quartz in a recent statement has revealed that key events of the UN General Assembly (UNGA) kick started this week with maximum presence of major world leaders. As announced, the centerpiece of the gathering of world leaders is the “general debate,” Sept. 19-29, when countries get to present their views to a plenary session of the UN on whatever topics take their fancy.
No doubts, hundreds or thousands of other official meetings, side conferences, panels, presentations, receptions, galas, and cocktail hours, and more organizations will be featuring in coming days. According to Quartz, it can be hard to know how to even begin to make sense of what the UNGA is about or what to pay attention to.
Recent UNGAs have tackled specific themes, such as the setting of the sustainable development goals, the run-up to the Paris climate agreement, and refugees. This year’s theme, “Focusing on People: Striving for Peace and a Decent Life for All on a Sustainable Planet” is as vague as they come.
Quartz quotes according to Richard Gowan, senior fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations, UN officials and most diplomats were wary of putting any specific issue on the agenda for a simple reason: “There are 190-plus countries and it’s a one-man show: It’s all Trump.”
“The main theme will be, ‘What does America First mean for the UN?’” says Stewart Patrick, a director at the Council on Foreign Relations and author of The Sovereignty Wars: Reconciling America with the World. “Does the US no longer see itself as an indispensable power? Do the other countries feel like it’s dispensable?”
Trump has openly and repeatedly expressed his distrust of the UN—just last week he dismissed the security council’s latest sanctions on North Korea as “not a big deal,” undercutting his own UN ambassador, Nikki Haley—so all eyes will be on whether he uses his first appearance at a general assembly to rail at the organization from the podium or limits himself to demanding cuts in financing to UN programs and complaining in less formal settings.
“I think everyone’s goal is to get to the end of next week without some sort of major diplomatic incident resulting from the president going off-beat,” says Gowan. So far, so good: Trump was calm and measured in his remarks at a meeting on UN reform this morning.
The US will bring a much smaller delegation than usual, Patrick says—about 300 people from the State Department, compared to the usual 1,000 or so. However, since Trump’s nationalistic chief strategist, Steve Bannon, has left the White House, Patrick says there may be “a pivot back to a more mainstream foreign policy.”
During the assembly, a number of issues will be discussed. These will include International relations, Environment, Refugees, World Health, Gender equality and Peacekeeping.
