Trump says UN is now club for people to chat

Says his victory has brought ‘hope’ to a ‘gloomy’ world

West Palm Beach, Florida, Dec. 27: Donald Trump is questioning the effectiveness of the United Nations, saying it’s just a club for people to “have a good time,” after the U.N. Security Council voted last week to condemn Israeli settlements in the West Bank and east Jerusalem.

The President-elect wrote on Twitter that the UN has “such great potential,” but it has become “just a club for people to get together, talk and have a good time. So sad!”

The Washington Post said Mr Trump’s tweet “signalled” that he would “likely challenge more than just the 71year-old institutions approach to the Middle East once he takes office”.

On Friday, Mr Trump had warned, “As to the UN, things will be different after Jan. 20th,” referring to the day he takes office.

The decision by the Obama administration to abstain from Friday’s UN vote brushed aside Mr Trump’s demands that the US exercise its veto and provided a climax to years of icy relations with Israel’s leadership.

In a previous tweet following the Security Council vote, he had said: “The big loss ... for Israel in the United ■ Nations will make it much harder to negotiate peace. Too bad, but we will get it done anyway!”

On Tuesday, Mr Trump also claimed to have brought “hope” to the world and that his election as president has boosted the economy.

“The world was gloomy before I won — there was no hope,” he said in a verified post on his Twitter account. “Now, the market is up nearly 10 per cent and Christmas spending is over a trillion dollars.”

Markets are up since Mr Trump won the general election, although not quite by that much. The Standard & Poor’s 500 is up about 6 per cent since Election Day, while the Dow has risen more than 8 per cent.

As for holiday spending, auditing and accounting firm Deloitte projected in September that total 2016 holiday sales were expected to exceed $1 trillion, representing a 3.6 per cent to 4.0 per cent increase in holiday sales from November through January. THE VETO EFFECT IN A SERIES OF TWEETS, DONALD TRUMP HITS OUT AT THE GLOBAL BODY

AHEAD of the vote, the president-elect had publicly asked the US to veto the resolution ■

TRUMP’S remarks come following a decision by President Obama to abstain from a UN vote condemning Israel’s settlements in the West Bank and parts of Jerusalem ■ The United Nations has such great potential but right now it is just a club for people to get together, talk and have a good time. So sad! — DONALD TRUMP, US President-elect