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Month: June 2024
Crisis unfolding in Sudan as internally displaced nears 10 million
GENEVA — The International Organization for Migration warns that the number of internally displaced people in Sudan soon will top 10 million, as conflict and acute hunger spread throughout the country.
Mohammed Refaat, the IOM’s chief of mission in Sudan, calls the crisis unfolding in Sudan a “catastrophic human tragedy.” He told journalists in Geneva on Friday that he was speaking from Port Sudan “with a heavy heart and a profound sense of urgency.”
“Today, I am not just a representative of a U.N. agency, I am a voice for millions of Sudanese whose lives have been forever altered by the ongoing crisis. Families have been torn apart, communities devastated, and the future put on hold. The human toll of this crisis is huge,” he said.
The IOM says that more than half of the 9.9 million people displaced inside Sudan are women and more than a quarter are children. Additionally, it says more than 2 million people have fled as refugees into neighboring countries, mainly to Chad, South Sudan, and Egypt.
Refaat observed that before rival generals of the Sudanese Armed Forces and paramilitary Rapid Support Forces went to war in mid-April 2023, displacement was largely concentrated within Darfur and Kordofan states. Since then, he said displacement has spread widely across all 18 states, with the majority, 36 percent, from the capital, Khartoum.
He said that 70 percent of people uprooted from their homes are trying to survive “in areas at risk of famine,” noting that most of those places are in the Darfur region, “which is currently the most difficult for humanitarians to reach.”
“The humanitarian situation has entered a new and alarming chapter, the outbreak of fighting in Al Fasher, the capital of North Darfur, putting over 800,000 civilians at risk,” he said. “Movement restrictions are choking the lifelines of those in the state, with crucial roads out of Al Fasher blocked and preventing civilians from reaching safer areas and limiting the amount of food and humanitarian aid coming into the city,”
The Food and Agriculture Organization and World Food Program issued a joint report on 18 world “hunger hotspots” Thursday in which they cite Sudan, along with Mali, Palestine, and South Sudan, as countries that “remain at the highest alert, and require the most urgent attention” to prevent famine.
According to the report, “18 million people are acutely food insecure, including 3.6 million children acutely malnourished, and famine is rapidly closing in on millions of people in Darfur, Kordofan, Al Jazirah, and Khartoum.”
“Conflict and displacement also continue at an alarming pace and magnitude in Sudan, where time is running out to save lives and the lean season looms,” the report warns.
Sudan historically has been a major transit and destination country for migrants. It traditionally has been a haven for many fleeing war, hunger and hardship from neighboring countries.
The IOM’s Refaat notes that the recent war has exacerbated the situation, however, “leaving many migrants and refugees stranded with limited access to support and services.”
Meanwhile, the World Health Organization warns that the health system in Sudan is collapsing. It notes about 65 percent of the Sudanese population lacks access to health care, just 25 percent of needed medical supplies are available and “only 20 to 30 percent of health facilities remain functional, at minimal levels” in hard-to-reach areas.
“At least two-thirds of the states are experiencing simultaneous outbreaks,” said WHO spokesperson Christian Lindmeier, noting that vaccination for measles has declined “due to the conflict.”
“Over 11,000 cases of cholera have been reported from 12 states and this is likely to be an underestimate, and there are also outbreaks of malaria and dengue,” he said, adding that many people are suffering from mental health, non-communicable and chronic diseases, including diabetes, hypertension, heart disease, and kidney failure for lack of treatment.
The IOM says that the prices of food, water and fuel are skyrocketing, making those essential goods unaffordable. This, at a time when “the world’s worst internal displacement crisis continues to escalate, with looming famine and disease adding to the havoc wrought by conflict,” it said in a statement Thursday.
Refaat said, “Aid agencies have struggled to keep pace with the growing needs. Funding shortfalls are impeding efforts to provide adequate shelter, food, and medical assistance.”
“Serious concerns are mounting about the long-term impact of the displacement on Sudan’s social and economic fabric,” he said, emphasizing that the IOM’s $312.5 million appeal to provide aid for 1.7 million people this year is only 19 percent funded.
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China defends Ukraine stance ahead of Switzerland peace summit
Taipei, Taiwan — China is pushing back against criticism by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy this week, denying claims it is pressuring countries not to attend next weekend’s peace conference in Switzerland and putting forward its own peace plan for the Ukraine war.
After Zelenskyy accused China of “working hard” to prevent countries from participating in the summit at the Shangri-La Dialogue on June 2, Beijing denied the Ukrainian president’s allegation Monday, saying Beijing remains “firmly committed to promoting talks for peace” and hopes the summit would not be “used to create bloc confrontation.”
“Not attending it does not mean not supporting peace,” Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Mao Ning told reporters Monday.
“China has never sat idly by or fueled the flames, still less profiteered from the conflict. Instead, we have worked relentlessly for a cease-fire, and this has been highly commended by various parties, including Russia and Ukraine,” she added.
Apart from pushing back against Zelenskyy’s criticism, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi also put forward a Chinese peace plan Tuesday.
“China believes that the world now needs to make more objective, balanced, positive, and constructive voices on the Ukraine crisis,” he told a joint press conference Tuesday with Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan.
Wang pointed to “the six common understandings on political settlement of the Ukraine Crisis,” a document jointly issued by China and Brazil last month, as Beijing’s plan to facilitate the peace process for the Ukraine war.
“In just one week, 45 countries from five continents have responded positively to the ‘six common understandings’ in different ways,” Wang said, noting that China will decide whether to join the “many summits” around the world independently.
Some analysts say Beijing’s reluctance to join the Switzerland session, which Zelenskyy said during a press conference in Singapore will be attended by 106 countries and at least 70 heads of state, is an attempt to avoid being attacked during the conference for supporting Russia.
“Beijing prefers to avoid this conference and instead, proposes its own vision to demonstrate that it is still committed to promoting peace,” Zhiqun Zhu, an expert on Chinese foreign policy at Bucknell University, told VOA in a written response.
Other experts say Beijing also sees many Western countries that plan to attend the conference in Switzerland, including the United States, as lacking the sincerity to resolve the Ukraine war peacefully.
“Beijing thinks Western countries that are attending the summit are not sincerely pro-peace,” said Temur Umarov, a fellow at the Carnegie Russia Eurasia Center, adding that China says its vision for resolving the Ukraine conflict, which is through a peace process that should involve both Ukraine and Russia, is not compatible with that put forward by the West.
“Beijing claims that the West is not sincere [about resolving the Ukraine War] and that there is a dual agenda in the West’s peace conference,” he told VOA by phone.
Shift in Ukraine’s view of China
While Beijing continues to portray itself as a neutral actor in the Ukraine war, Zelenskyy’s rare public criticism of China reflects a shift in Ukraine’s view of China. During a press conference at the Shangri-La Dialogue, Zelenskyy said it is unfortunate that China “is an instrument in the hands of [Russian President Vladimir] Putin.”
Some analysts say Zelenskyy’s comments in Singapore show that Ukraine’s initial hope that China would be neutral in the war is diminishing.
“One might say that there were some hopes in Kyiv’s leadership that Beijing would be neutral with regard to the war, [but] these hopes are now gone,” said Volodymyr Dubovyk, director of the Center for International Studies at the Odesa Mechnikov National University in Ukraine.
While the shift in Zelenskyy’s tone toward China is notable, Dubovyk told VOA it is unclear whether this will have a lasting impact on Ukraine-China relations.
“One might safely forecast that Beijing’s entanglement with Russia is only going to deepen, thus antagonizing Ukraine, yet China may still come [up] with a certain peace plan that would be less pro-Russian and more balanced,” he said.
Following the spat between Beijing and Kyiv, Chinese Vice Foreign Minister Sun Weidong and Ukrainian First Deputy Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha held political consultations in Beijing on Wednesday regarding the war and bilateral relations.
While Sun reiterated Beijing’s commitment to advance exchanges with Kyiv, Sybiha urged China to take part in the summit, arguing that Beijing could “make a practical contribution to achieving a just and lasting peace in Ukraine.”
Umarov said Ukraine hopes to secure China’s participation in the summit because of Beijing’s influence in the world and over Russia.
“The way to legitimize the summit is to have as many participants as possible, [but] I doubt Beijing will change its position on the war in Ukraine,” he told VOA.
As Zelenskyy keeps urging countries to join the session, Zhu said he thinks China’s absence would reduce the importance of the conference.
“With the absence of Russia and China, the summit’s significance will be reduced,” he told VOA.
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No agreement in Africa on proposed merging of economic groups
YAOUNDE, CAMEROON — Presidents and finance ministers from eleven central African countries have failed to agree on merging three economic blocs.
Analysts say breaking down economic barriers among member countries of the Central African Economic and Monetary Community, CEMAC, the Economic Community of Central African States, ECCAS, and the Economic Community of the Great Lakes Countries CEPGL will boost trade and growth in a region that is said to be among the poorest and most conflict-ridden in the world.
But after a meeting in Cameroon’s capital, officials say combining the three economic blocs will take longer than the leaders of the regions expect.
Gilberto Da Piedade Verissimo is the president of ECCAS.
He says the process of merging the economic blocs is taking longer than planned because of a lack of political will, conflicting interests and bureaucratic duplication among 3 rival economic groups. He says each time there is a leadership change, ECCAS officials start explaining the importance of fusing the economic blocs for the general interest of the eleven central African states to new governments all over again because different leaders have different understandings of the combination.
Verissimo said merging economic blocs will stop the duplication of regional projects such as airlines, roads, electricity, agriculture and aquaculture, making it easier for funding agencies to invest in such projects.
ECCAS consists of Cameroon, Chad, the Central African Republic, Gabon, Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Angola, Burundi, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Rwanda and Sao Tome and Principe and was created in 1983. It is officially recognized by the African Union as central Africa’s regional economic community.
In 1999 Cameroon, Chad, Central African Republic, Gabon, Congo and Equatorial Guinea launched CEMAC, but remained members of ECCAS.
In 2003 Burundi, the Democratic Republic of Congo and Rwanda created CEPGL but also remained in ECCAS.
The three economic blocs claim that their mission is to facilitate the free movement of goods and persons across borders and promote regional integration, reduce inequality and poverty.
But the African Union, or AU, says the central African states remain among the poorest countries, although their economic and social potential is very strong. In 2006, the AU asked central African leaders to merge the three economic blocs.
Edouard Normand Bigendaka is the governor of the Bank of the Republic of Burundi. He says the participants in the Yaounde meeting created an organization to examine a new currency to replace the West African CFA Franc and the Central African CFA Franc.
“This high monetary authority will be in charge of preparing the different steps towards a free trade zone and then a common market, so that’s the rationale of having a common currency,” Bigendaka said. “There are a number of steps that have to be put in place by member countries before we attain this particular objective.”
Cameroon’s Prime Minister Joseph Dion Ngute represented President Paul Biya at the meeting.
Ngute says despite the challenges, committed leaders of the region will continue advocating for a strong regional economic community that will improve business, encourage the free movement of people and reduce poverty. He says central African states cannot continue to think that they can single handedly solve their problems while other countries, including developed nations, are counting on economic blocs to tackle their problems.
The AU says fusing the economic blocs will facilitate trade and growth among central Africa’s 240 million inhabitants and allow member states to concentrate on infrastructure development and jointly combating climate shocks, terrorism and armed groups that are destabilizing the eleven countries.
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Canadian volunteer helps displaced Ukrainians from hard-hit areas
Paul Hughes, a former hockey coach from Canada, arrived in Kharkiv in March 2022. In the two years since, he and other volunteers — some local, some foreign — have been helping Ukrainians internally displaced by the war survive. Anna Kosstutschenko has his story. Videographer: Pavel Suhodolskiy.
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South African opposition parties holding crunch talks on the ANC’s unity plan. But deep rifts remain
JOHANNESBURG — South African opposition parties were meeting Friday and will continue crunch talks into next week to consider the ruling African National Congress’ offer to become part of a government of national unity.
ANC failed to secure a majority in last week’s highly contested election, but some opposition parties are already rejecting the party’s offer because of deep-seated divisions.
Senior officials of the main opposition Democratic Alliance, or DA, will meet on Monday to discuss the centrist party’s approach to the negotiations. The top leadership of the the leftist Economic Freedom Fighters, or EFF, party were holding talks on Friday.
Parties are under pressure to conclude negotiations and reach an agreement by June 16, because South Africa’s constitution requires them to do so within 14 days after the declaration of the election results.
South African President Cyril Ramaphosa, who is ANC leader, announced on Thursday that the party had decided to form a government of national unity and had invited all parties to join, a process that is expected to be complex considering vast divisions among the opposition parties themselves.
Most of the opposition parties don’t differ only with the ANC on various socioeconomic policies, but are also at extreme odds with each other on economic policies like land redistribution and affirmative action.
Opposition party ActionSA has already declared it won’t be part of the negotiations, saying that it refuses to work with the ANC.
In what looks likely to be a government of national unity reminiscent of a path taken by the Nelson Mandela-led ANC after the country’s first democratic election in 1994, the party has decided to invite a myriad of opposition parties to be part of the government.
While Mandela insisted on a unity government despite the ANC having won by an overwhelming majority with nearly 63% of the national vote, the ANC has been forced into the current situation by its worst electoral performance ever, dropping from the 57.5% it got in the 2019 election to 40% this year, a decline of 17.5%.
Shortly after Ramaphosa’s announcement, the EFF’s leader took to X to reject Ramaphosa’s proposal of a government of national unity and accused the ANC of arrogance despite failing to win a majority.
The EFF is among the top five parties after the election with just over 9% of the national vote, having declined from the 11% it garnered in 2019 but is expected to form a crucial part of the eventual outcome of the negotiations.
“The arrogance continues even after the South African voters issued warning signs. You can’t dictate the way forward as if you have won elections,” EFF leader Julius Malema said. “We are not desperate for anything, ours is a generational mission.
“We can’t share power with the enemy,” Malema said.
In 2023, DA declared the Economic Freedom Fighters as its No. 1 enemy.
DA, which got just over 21% of the national vote to remain the second-biggest party, said its highest decision-making body, the Federal Council, would meet on Monday to consider its options.
“I can’t say now what the position of the DA is, we have a whole negotiation team and we are meeting as the federal council on Monday. We will have a framework for negotiations that we will release this weekend,” Democratic Alliance federal chairperson Helen Zille said Friday.
The fifth-biggest party with nearly 4% of the national vote, the Inkatha Freedom Party, on Friday expressed willingness to be part of the government of national unity, but was also set to discuss the matter with its party structures over the next few days.
“In principle, the IFP is not averse to a GNU (government of national unity). However, the devil is in the details, which will become clearer in the coming days … enabling the IFP to make a well-considered decision,” IFP spokesman Mkhuleko Hlengwa said.
The uMkhonto weSizwe Party led by former President Jacob Zuma, who left the ANC, was the latest to enter the negotiations, with the party confirming on Thursday that it had begun talks with the ANC after initially failing to respond to the party’s invitation.
The party has raised objections about the election results to the country’s electoral body, citing alleged voting irregularities and threatening to boycott the first sitting of Parliament to swear in the country’s new lawmakers.
Economists say that the markets are keenly awaiting the outcome of the negotiations to see the composition of the next government of Africa’s most developed economy, and the economic policies it will pursue.
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Amid war, Putin looks east at investment forum
ST. PETERSBURG, Russia — Cut off from the West, Russia is pitching its $2 trillion economy to giants like China and Saudi Arabia and longer-term prospects like Zimbabwe and Afghanistan at its premier investment forum in St. Petersburg, which was founded by the czars as a window to Europe.
The war in Ukraine has led to the biggest upheaval in Russia’s relations with the West since the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis, and Western sanctions have forced a once-in-a-century revolution in Russia’s economic relations.
Since Peter the Great laid the foundations of the modern Russian state and made St. Petersburg the capital in the early 18th century, Russia’s rulers have looked to the West as a source of technology, investment and ideas.
The 2022 invasion of Ukraine, though, has forced President Vladimir Putin to pivot towards Asia and the rest of the non-Western world amid what the Kremlin says amounts to an economic blockade by the United States and its European allies.
Western sanctions have not torpedoed Russia’s economy, however, and Moscow has nurtured ties with China, major regional powers in the Middle East and across Africa and Latin America.
It is less clear, though, how much cash these countries are prepared to invest in Russia’s economy, and at what price. No blockbuster deals have been announced so far.
But Russian officials say it is just beginning — and that relations with the West are ruined for a generation.
Bolivian President Luis Arce, who will join Putin at the main session of the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum, said he wanted to share the experience of Bolivia’s new economic model — with a big state — since 2006.
“We have our own economic model, which we have been implementing since 2006, and we want to share this experience,” Arce told Putin.
Zimbabwean President Emmerson Mnangagwa is attending, as are 45 other foreign officials including the Saudi energy minister, Oman’s minister of trade and commerce, and a senior Taliban official.
Russian trade with Zimbabwe is tiny though — just $168 million in 2023 versus Russian-European Union trade of $300 billion in the year before Russia invaded Ukraine.
Gone from the forum are the Western investors and investment bankers who once flocked to secure a slice of Russia’s vast mineral wealth and one of Europe’s biggest consumer markets. Reuters saw no major Western companies at the forum.
Largely gone too are the 1990s oligarchs who made fortunes wheeling and dealing in the chaos of a collapsing superpower.
In Putin’s Russia the main arbiter is the state, controlled by the former Cold War spies and technocrats in his entourage.
Chinese dragon
State-controlled banks such as Sberbank, VTB and VEB have massive stands, as do Russian regions and ministries along with resource giants such as Gazprom Neft and Novatek.
In a sign of the times, Alfa Bank’s stand was a vast Chinese inflated dragon adorned with Chinese characters and an assertion that Alfa was “the best bank for business with China.”
Chinese luxury car brand Hongqi featured armored vehicles. A delegation from the Taliban, still officially banned in Russia, toured the stands. The Taliban originally drew members from fighters who, with U.S. support, repelled Soviet forces in the 1980s.
The theme of the forum is the statement: “The foundation of a multipolar world is the formation of new points of growth.”
While Russia’s economy has shown resilience in the face of stringent Western sanctions, prices are rising as defense spending balloons.
In dollar terms, the economy is about the same size it was a decade ago, and Putin is locked into an economic war with the West, whose financial might is at least 25 times bigger than Russia’s on a nominal GDP basis.
From many foreign attendees there was praise for Russia. “This year’s event has grown in size… There are a lot of opportunities,” Nebeolisa Anako, an official from Nigeria, told Reuters.
“The West may be actually isolating themselves as they are a minority in the world, although a very important part of the world. It is always better to cooperate with other parts of the world.”
Other officials from Africa and the Middle East echoed those words.
Saudi Energy Minister Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman met Putin’s energy point man, Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Novak, at the forum.
Novak said “friendly countries” took the vast majority of its oil exports and that about 70% of it was paid for in national currencies.
“We already supply 95% of oil and petroleum products to friendly countries this year in four months,” Novak said.
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Biden to meet Zelenskyy in France with $225 million in military aid
PARIS — U.S. President Joe Biden will meet Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in Paris on Friday with a package of $225 million in weapons on the sidelines of D-Day anniversary events.
It will be their first face-to-face talks since Zelenskyy visited Washington in December, when the two wrestled with Republican opposition to more Ukraine aid. They will meet again next week at a G7 summit in Italy, as rich nations discuss using Russian assets frozen after the Ukraine invasion to provide $50 billion for Ukraine.
Zelenskyy told Reuters last month that Western countries are taking too long to make decisions about aid.
Biden in remarks in Normandy, France, on Thursday drew a link between the World War Two battle against tyranny and Ukraine’s war with Russia, calling Russian President Vladimir Putin a “dictator.”
The $225 million in new weaponry includes artillery rounds and air defense interceptors, among other items, sources said.
Ukraine has struggled to defend the Kharkiv region after an offensive launched by Moscow on May 10 has overrun some villages.
Biden last week shifted his position and decided Ukraine could launch U.S.-supplied weapons at military targets inside Russia that are supporting the Kharkiv offensive.
The United States is trying to catch up with Ukraine’s weaponry needs, deputy national security adviser Jon Finer said in Washington on Thursday.
“If there were two things that we could provide an infinite number of to the Ukrainians to try to turn the tide in this war, it would be artillery munitions and air defense interceptors,” but the U.S. lacked supply, Finer told a forum by the Center for a New American Security.
Outside the physical battlefield, the Russia-Ukraine war is “also a competition that takes place in our factories, the factories in Europe, the factories in Ukraine,” he said.
Reaching consensus on the frozen assets has been complicated, Daleep Singh, deputy national security adviser for international economics, told the same group.
“We’re waist-deep in the sausage-making of trying to strike a deal,” said Singh, who said he was heading back to Italy on Friday to continue the negotiations.
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Somalia joins UN Security Council after more than 50 years
WASHINGTON — The United Nations General Assembly on Thursday elected Somalia to the 15-member U.N. Security Council for a two-year term starting in 2025.
The tiny Horn of Africa nation was among five countries that received the winning votes, alongside Denmark, Greece, Pakistan, and Panama.
“It is both symbolic and strong diplomatic status for Somalia to appear among the Security Council members and this will help Somalia to have a better access for member nations,” said Somalia analyst Abdiqafar Abdi Wardhere, who is based in Virginia.
For the first time in more than 50 years, he said, Somalia will have a vote on decisions regarding world conflicts.
“The Security Council is the only U.N. body that can make legally binding decisions such as imposing sanctions and authorizing use of force. Therefore, Somalia would get a vote that determines the world issues and resolutions,” Wardhere said.
Announcing the elections’ results, the U.N. General Assembly President Dennis Francis, said, “In a secret ballot, the elected countries secured the required two-thirds majority of Member States present and voting in the 193-member General Assembly.”
Following the news, the United Nations in Somalia congratulated the Somali government and its people “on their country’s election today to a seat on the UN Security Council for 2025-2026.”
“Somalia has come a long way over the past three decades on its path to peace, prosperity, and security,” said the UN Secretary-General’s Acting Special Representative for Somalia James Swan. “Election to a seat on the Security Council is recognition of that commendable progress.”
“Somalia’s experiences place it in a unique position to contribute to Council deliberations on international peace and security,” Swan added.
The Security Council’s five permanent veto-wielding members are Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States.
The five countries that got elected Thursday will replace Ecuador, Japan, Malta, Mozambique and Switzerland, whose terms end December 31.
Somali and the other elected new members will join existing non-permanent members Algeria, Guyana, the Republic of Korea, Sierra Leone and Slovenia, whose terms started in January.
According to United Nations, the 10 non-permanent seats on the Security Council are distributed according to four regional groupings: Africa and Asia; Eastern Europe; Latin America and the Caribbean; and the Western European and other States group.
The newly elected members were endorsed by their respective regional groups and ran largely uncontested.
Margaret Besheer contributed this report from New York.
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US stuns Pakistan in cricket’s T-20 World Cup
UNICEF: 1 in 4 young children lives in severe food poverty
Veterans honored during 80th anniversary of D-Day invasion
A small number of U.S. World War II veterans, all in their late 90s and early 100s, returned to Normandy, France, 80 years after the largest invasion in history. VOA’s Kane Farabaugh reports.
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Putin: Any deal to free American journalist must benefit Moscow
UN member states approve 5 countries for Security Council seats
United Nations — The U.N. General Assembly approved five new members Thursday for two-year terms on the organization’s powerful 15-nation Security Council in a lackluster “election.”
Denmark, Greece, Pakistan, Panama and Somalia will start their terms on Jan. 1, 2025.
The annual election is often little more than a rubber stamp of candidates previously agreed within regional blocs. This year, all five candidates ran unchallenged in what is known as a “clean slate” but still needed to win a two-thirds majority of votes to succeed, which they easily did.
While it is the permanent five members — Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States — who have veto wielding power, the 10 elected members help balance the council, and in recent years have banded together more to use their collective weight.
“At the moment, there’s a lot of pressure on the elected members to keep the body working in a period when the permanent members are fiercely divided and often at each other’s throats,” Richard Gowan, U.N. director for the International Crisis Group and a long-time U.N. watcher, told VOA ahead of the vote.
Geopolitical divisions between Russia and China on one hand, and the United States, Britain and France on the other, have grown deeper since Russia’s illegal invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. Moscow, Beijing and Washington have repeatedly vetoed the other’s draft resolutions in the council or brought competing ones on the same topic, eroding the council’s ability to take action to mitigate conflicts in Ukraine, Syria and Gaza.
“It’s very tough to be an elected member, because you are trapped between the U.S., Russia and China,” Gowan noted. “The big powers are willing to put a lot of pressure on the smaller countries when they want to.”
Of the incoming group of five, Gowan says expectations are especially high for Denmark.
“The Nordic countries have a long history of effective and skillful U.N. diplomacy,” he said, noting that Norway played an important role during its council tenure in 2022 in advancing humanitarian assistance for Afghanistan while the P5 were clashing over Ukraine.
“I think there’s an expectation that Denmark is going to take on a lot of responsibilities, a lot of difficult files, and there’s an assumption that just as a Scandinavian nation, it knows how to make the Security Council work,” he said.
Greece’s foreign minister said they hope to be a facilitator between nations.
“We aspire to provide bridges between South and North, East and West,” Giorgos Gerapetritis told reporters.
It is rare to have a country that has a U.N. political assistance mission and an African Union mission with troops and police in its country on the council. Somalia has been fighting al-Shabab militants, which the United Nations says still pose a serious threat to the country, and working to rebuild its government institutions after a decades-long civil war. Somalia is a regular item on the council’s agenda.
Somalia’s foreign minister sought to characterize their recent history as an asset to the council.
“We are fully prepared to bring our distinct perspectives, experiences and solutions to the global arena, making a meaningful contribution to the work of the U.N. Security Council in the maintenance of international peace and security,” Ahmed Moallin Fiqi told reporters after the election.
Panama’s foreign minister said she appreciated the international community’s faith in her country, especially at a fraught time in the world.
“It’s a great challenge, especially in the face of the critical geopolitical moments we are living, in which this challenge is not only the survival of the constituted world order, but also the survival of the inhabitants of the planet,” said Janaina Tewaney.
Panama, which has seen its namesake canal dry up in recent years, has said the impact of climate change on peace and security will be one of its council priorities.
In exercising their responsibility for maintaining international peace and security, the 15 nations on the Security Council have the power to authorize the use of force, deploy peacekeeping missions and impose sanctions.
On January 1, the five new members will replace Ecuador, Japan, Malta, Mozambique and Switzerland, whose terms will end on December 31. They will join nonpermanent members Algeria, Guyana, Sierra Leone, Slovenia and South Korea, who will remain on the council through 2025, along with the permanent members.
Later Thursday, the General Assembly will reconvene to approve Cameroon’s former prime minister, Philemon Yang, as president of the 79th session of the General Assembly, which will begin Sept. 10, 2024, and run for one year.
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Spain joins South Africa’s UN case on Israel genocide accusations
Biden on D-Day: West won’t abandon Ukraine
COLLEVILLE-SUR-MER, FRANCE — U.S. President Joe Biden on Thursday marked the solemnity of the 80th anniversary of the D-Day landing of Allied troops on the shores of Normandy by vowing that the United States and NATO would not abandon support for Ukraine in its fight against Russia’s two-year invasion.
Speaking in Colleville-sur-Mer, France, Biden said “we will not walk away” from Ukraine’s defense and “surrender to bullies.”
The U.S. leader said Ukraine was invaded by Russian President Vladimir Putin, a “tyrant intent on domination,” and that democracy is now more at risk than at any point since World War II.
“Make no mistake, we will not bow down, we cannot surrender to the bullies, it is simply unthinkable. If we do, freedom will be subjugated, all Europe will be threatened,” he said in offering wide support for the global world order that emerged in the aftermath of World War II.
“To surrender to bullies, to bow down to dictators, is simply unthinkable,” he said during a ceremony at the American cemetery in Normandy. “If we were to do that, it means we’d be forgetting what happened here on these hallowed beaches.”
D-Day was the largest amphibious assault in history, and Biden called it a “powerful illustration of how alliances, real alliances make us stronger.”
He said that was “a lesson that I pray we Americans never forget.”
Biden greeted World War II veterans who participated in the D-Day landings, including many in wheelchairs and some who are more than 100 years old.
“You saved the world,” Biden told one veteran. He greeted each veteran one by one, offering a salute or a handshake, and handing them a special coin he had designed for the occasion.
Biden’s appearance came in the midst of his 2024 reelection campaign for the presidency against Republican Donald Trump, who spoke at the 75th anniversary of D-Day five years ago.
Trump, who has often questioned the necessity of the U.S. commitment to NATO, the West’s main military alliance, hailed the soldiers who stormed the beaches of Normandy in his 2019 speech but did not praise the global alliances that emerged after the war.
Trump has often attacked European members of NATO who do not spend the equivalent of 2% of their national economic output on defense, a NATO-suggested level for defense of their own countries.
Biden has cited his administration’s record of building global alliances as a key accomplishment. He recently told Time magazine that Trump “wanted to just abandon” U.S. allies and suggested the former president would ultimately pull the country out of NATO if he is elected.
VOA’s Anita Powell contributed to this report from Colleville-Sur-Mer
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