Trygve Lie
- Stephen Schlesinger
- • October 11, 2022
United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres started out wobbly on the Ukrainian crisis. In the days leading up to the Feb. 24 Russian attack on Ukraine, he remained on the sidelines. He was apparently unconvinced that the Russians would invade…
- Categories: General Assembly, Peace and Security, Secretary-General, Ukraine-Russia War, WORLDVIEWS
- Thomas G. Weiss
- • June 16, 2021
António Guterres soon will be recrowned Secretary-General after Manhattan’s five-member Electoral College, the permanent members of the Security Council, send its recommendation to the General Assembly for a ceremonial vote. In 2016, his election was an unusually transparent process…
- Categories: SDGs, Secretary-General, WORLDVIEWS
- Dali ten Hove
- • May 3, 2021
The job of United Nations secretary-general is the “most impossible on earth,” as the first postholder, Trygve Lie, famously told his successor, Dag Hammarskjold. Though Lie spoke partly in jest to amuse the assembled reporters, the remark has stuck…
- Stephen Schlesinger
- • May 8, 2019
Sir Brian Urquhart has celebrated his 100th birthday this year. This is an eventful moment. Sir Brian is one of the most notable figures in the history of the United Nations. Urquhart has spent most of his entire life…
- Categories: WORLDVIEWS
- Helmut Volger
- • July 1, 2015
BERLIN — If you take a close look at the public schedule of United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, it becomes evident that he travels a lot to member states, even more than his charismatic and most active predecessor Kofi…
- Categories: WORLDVIEWS
- Dulcie Leimbach
- • February 23, 2015
Convinced that after 70 years it is time to choose a woman for the United Nations’ top job of secretary-general, a new movement led by an academic spcialist on the organization has been assembled to formally support the election…
- Categories: Secretary-General, Security Council, US-UN Relations, Women
- Lucia Mouat
- • January 21, 2015
The post of United Nations secretary-general may or may not be “the world’s most impossible job,” as its first occupant, Trygve Lie, a Norwegian, once described it. In any case, UN members must choose a successor to Secretary-General Ban…
- Categories: Secretary-General, Security Council, US-UN Relations
- Stephen Browne  and Thomas G. Weiss
- • December 9, 2014
GENEVA — For only the second time — the first was in 1996 — the electoral campaigns for the American president and the United Nations secretary-general are running in parallel. Both promise to be long and protracted. Each already…
- Categories: SDGs, WORLDVIEWS
- Barbara Crossette
- • April 17, 2014
There have been eight secretaries-general of the United Nations in the 68 years since the first of them, Trygve Lie of Norway, took on this unique global position. All eight — all men — have been very different in…
- Categories: BOOKS
- Dulcie Leimbach
- • August 13, 2013
Set discreetly within the 17-acre compound of the United Nations on the East River, about 1,550 roses grow and bloom year after year. The UN roses, flowers with imaginative names, are donated by All America Rose Selections, a nonprofit…
- Categories: US-UN Relations
- Lucia Mouat
- • July 18, 2013
Who knew there was once such hot competition to host the United Nations? Not even the author of a book on the topic, when she first started out. One day in her home city of Philadelphia, Charlene Mires, an…
- Categories: BOOKS
- Helmut Volger
- • August 13, 2012
BERLIN — When the United Nations has been fortunate to have a secretary-general who has great charisma and skills in settling conflicts, the world tends to consider him a figure with his own political status and powers. People like…
- Categories: General Assembly, WORLDVIEWS
THIS WEEK'S MOST POPULAR
UN-SCRIPTED, PASSBLUE'S UN PODCAST SERIES
