World powers clash, virus stirs anger at virtual UN meeting

UNITED NATIONS >> Kept apart by a devastating pandemic and dispersed across the globe, world leaders convened electronically Tuesday for an unprecedented high-level meeting, where the U.N. chief exhorted them to unite and tackle the era’s towering problems: the coronavirus, the “economic calamity” it unleashed and the risk of a new Cold War between the United States and China.

As Secretary-General Antonio Guterres opened the first virtual “general debate” of the U.N. General Assembly, the yawning gaps of politics and anger became evident. China and Iran clashed with the United States — via prerecorded videos from home — and leaders expressed frustration and anger at the handling of the COVID-19 pandemic, which the U.N. chief has called “the number one global security threat in our world today.”

As he began his speech, the secretary-general looked out at the vast General Assembly chamber, where only one mask-wearing diplomat from each of the U.N.’s 193 member nations was allowed to sit, socially distanced from one another.

“The COVID-19 pandemic has changed our annual meeting beyond recognition,” Guterres said. “But it has made it more important than ever.”

While the six-day mainly virtual meeting is unique in the U.N.’s 75-year history, the speeches from leaders hit on all the conflicts, crises and divisions facing a world that Guterres said is witnessing “rising inequalities, climate catastrophe, widening societal divisions, rampant corruption.”

In his grim state of the world speech, he said “the pandemic has exploited these injustices, preyed on the most vulnerable and wiped away the progress of decades,” including sparking the first rise in poverty in 30 years.

The secretary-general called for global unity, foremost to fight the pandemic, and sharply criticized populism and nationalism for failing to contain the virus and for often making things worse.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan criticized how “countries were left on their own” at the onset of the pandemic, stressing that “effective multilateralism requires effective multilateral institutions.” He urged rapid U.N. reforms, starting with the Security Council, the most powerful body with five veto-wielding members — the U.S., China, Russia, Britain and France.