NZ’s UN lead role still about change

W

I would have found it confronting before we had Koby, but now I think it’s a great thing. hichever conflict you judge them by, the United Nations Security Council has hardly covered itself in glory.

And when New Zealand sits at the head chair of the world’s most powerful table next month, don’t expect much to change.

New Zealand is coming up for its second and final presidency on the Security Council. What will that give us? The power to convene, to set the agenda.

And with limited time left on the council as a member, the New Zealand diplomatic team under permanent representative Gerard van Boheman has a big job ahead.

Foreign Affairs Minister Murray McCully is on a European tour, where he will no doubt hash out some last-minute talks to develop the programme of work New Zealand wants to pursue. Russia and the US mostly do the opposite of what the other is doing.

His meetings will include three permanent members of the UN Security Council: Britain, Russia and France.

It’s likely he’ll also apply some strategy on behalf of Secretary General-hopeful Helen Clark, whose campaign for the job has stalled under a weighty amount of ‘‘discourages’’, some of which are likely to be from the veto-wielding members.

But the struggles New Zealand faces to make its last showing count are massive.

They come from the five permanent members, who mostly say they want to improve the UN but do not want to give up power in the process.

Russia and the US mostly do the opposite of what the other is doing, and Russia believes the West is mostly against them. Often it is.

International diplomacy is as much about what other countries perceive is happening, as what is actually happening.

Russia has been known to reason that if it gave up its veto, it would likely be steamrolled on all decisions by the US and others

It would be left with little option but to walk away from all it was doing, and disengage. So surely it’s better to have Russia at the table?

It’s hard to argue with the logic, even though it seems unworkably combative.

So New Zealand’s job before and during its presidency is to work on what it promised it would do to gain its seats in the first place – affect behavioural change.

We hear whispers that the likes of Russia and Britain have voiced immense gratitude at New Zealand’s influence on the council – if only we sided with both a little more often. And that probably means we’re getting the balance about right. Less so are diplomats turning up to the table and reading out the talking points approved only by their respective capitals.

That is partly because of New Zealand’s influence and the willingness of others to fix the issues that have rendered this body cripplingly slow where it counts. Affecting lasting change is the real test.