David Beasley, the executive director of the World Food Program, based in Rome, posted a prayer at the top of his Twitter page in early January, reading: “My prayer for 2018: Peace. Our path to Zero Hunger begins with peace.” The page, @dbeasley1, is a hybrid of personal tweets and professional news about his work … Read more
GENEVA — Change is in the air again on First Avenue. Among numerous reform options being bandied about, none will be more consequential than those on financing the United Nations system. There are the sledgehammer arguments: drastic slashes in funding by Washington and other donors could precipitate dramatic change. As we have argued in these … Read more
With White House proposals to slash United States assessments and donations to international organizations now in play in the writing of a federal budget for 2018 — as an April 28 deadline approaches — the extent of potential losses to the United Nations is coming into sharp focus. The US, for example, has immediately begun … Read more
WASHINGTON, D.C. — Strong American leadership at the United Nations would greatly enhance President-elect Trump’s foreign policy agenda. United States investment in the UN is an effective use of taxpayer dollars to serve the US military, diplomatic, economic and national security interests. UN peacekeepers, for example, cost one-eighth the expenses of US boots on the … Read more
ÉCHENEVEX, France — While psychological trauma affects perhaps as many as 500 million victims worldwide, and adversely impacts human and social development on a massive scale, its most devastating — but least suspected — effect may well be the potential for peace. How? Because people who have been traumatized by violence or abuse could easily … Read more
The surprising move in 2010 by a repressive Burmese military regime to begin ceding power to the nation’s people was just the beginning of a tangled story. The new democracy held its first credible election less than two years later — an election that catapulted Aung San Suu Kyi, barely 18 months free of house … Read more
BERLIN — The fight against hunger became a primary goal of the United Nations system early on. In 1943, United States President Franklin D. Roosevelt convened an international conference that reached agreement on the founding of the Food and Agriculture Organization, and two years later, on Oct. 16, 1945, only days before the founding … Read more
In his new book, “Living With the UN: American Responsibilities and International Order,” Kenneth Anderson forces readers who lean sympathetically toward the United Nations to consider why they support it despite its faults. On the other hand, the acerbic views of Anderson, a law professor at American University, about the UN are deeply colored by his … Read more
GUIDAN ROUMDJI, Niger — Her food reserves have almost run out, but Tini Kane, 50 years old and widowed three times, must feed all 23 members of her family. Like many other Nigerien farmers, she sold her precious goats to cope with the bad harvests of this year and last, even though she still goes … Read more
The first of the eight Millennium Development Goals makes an ambitious demand: eradicate extreme poverty and hunger worldwide. It is now widely accepted that progress has been made in many countries on cutting the percentage of people living with less than the rock-bottom $1.25 a day. But decreasing hunger by half is another sadder story. … Read more
