This Week @UN: UN crossword, anyone?; Trump targets the Refugee Convention; Slovenia softens on SG race; Russia must return Ukrainian children.
Plus: Billions of unpaid UN dues; separate Israeli airstrikes hit Syria and Lebanon; Myanmar #1 in opium; Sudan death spiral; real peace in Congo?
• For the first time in six years, the UN Security Council visited the Mideast, led by Slovenia with Algeria and Denmark. The itinerary, from Wednesday to Friday this week, included a day in Damascus, Syria (a first for the Council); another day in Beirut, Lebanon; and a day at the UN peacekeeping mission in south Lebanon. The US ambassador to the UN, Mike Waltz, did not take part in the trip, but Morgan Ortagus, US deputy special presidential envoy to the Mideast, participated.
Council media briefing in Damascus, Dec. 4. The Slovenian mission to the UN has great photos posted of the trip. UN video clips of meetings with Lebanese officials, including the president and the prime minister, posted on PassBlue’s X account. Briefing by Council at the UNIFIL peacekeeping mission.
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• Our #1 story: The Ultimate Guide for the Upcoming UN Secretary-General Race, by Ben Donaldson
• We asked Rafael Mariano Grossi, who heads the International Atomic Energy Agency and is a candidate for UN secretary-general (officially endorsed by his government, Argentina), if he would step down from his post during his campaign, per a UN General Assembly resolution, saying: “Candidates holding positions in the United Nations system should consider suspending their work in the United Nations system during the campaign, with a view to avoiding any conflict of interest that may arise from their functions and adjacent advantages.”
Grossi’s email response Dec. 1: “On your point on the suspension of my functions, I may recall that neither the General Assembly Resolution 79/327 nor the joint letter of the Presidents of the UNGA and the UNSC of 25 November set an obligation to suspend work, but only to consider [his italics]
• Giles Duley, a British photographer and UN Global Advocate for Persons with Disabilities in Conflict and Peacebuilding Situations, told reporters on the International Day for Persons with Disabilities, Dec. 3, that in his three-year stint, which ends this month, UN entities focusing on people with disabilities did not have that “lived experience” and that he has not “been able to have a meeting with the UK representative to the UN.” He added about the UN: “Again and again, we have tried to see people, to share these stories, and again and again and again, the door has remained shut.” — DULCIE LEIMBACH
• Dark skies: Toshiyuki Onuma, Japan’s ambassador to the Montreal-based International Civil Aviation Organization, a UN specialized agency, has been elected ICAO president, starting Jan. 1, 2026, for a three-year term. Onuma, 56, heads into the geopolitics playing out in the skies, making ICAO’s mission of “serving as the global forum of States for international civil aviation” look simple in comparison.
After President Trump’s unilateral declaration on Nov. 29 that Venezuelan airspace was “closed,” fears of a US ground intervention persist. President Gustavo Petro of Colombia chimed in on the matter, urging the outgoing Secretary-General of ICAO, Salvatore Sciacchiatino, “to convene the Assembly immediately” and asked airline companies in the Latin American-Caribbean region to resume their normal flights. Currently, the Venezuelan sky remains an exclusion zone, although the country’s transport ministry announced on Dec. 2 that twice-weekly extradition flights to and from the US will go on, per a Trump administration request.
Onuma is a civil aviation bureaucrat with more than three decades of service at the Japanese Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism. He told Japanese media that he aimed to enhance aviation safety and promote carbon neutrality. He will preside over ICAO’s council of 36 elected member states, including Colombia, Japan and the US, but the latter representative’s name is blank. — ILGIN YORULMAZ
New from PassBlue:
• PassBlue’s New UN Crossword: This weekend, try our new UN-theme digital crossword puzzle, designed by our managing editor, John Penney, who is also our staff photographer extraordinaire.
• Can Trump Dismantle the UN Refugee Convention?, op-ed by Jeff Crisp, from the UK
• Slovenia Calls for Easing the Selection Process of the Next UN Chief, by Damilola Banjo, from New York City
• UN General Assembly Demands That Russia Return Ukrainian Children Amid the War, by Damilola Banjo, NYC
• Gaza/West Bank updates via UN, Dec. 1-5:
Gaza: The UN continues to receive reports of Israeli airstrikes, shelling and gunfire in all five governorates of the Strip, causing civilian casualties, displacement and destruction. In the ongoing effort to improve access to water and sanitation, UN partners report that 42 truckloads of debris have been cleared over 48 hours to reach wells in North Gaza. Forty-two health facilities, including four hospitals, have opened or resumed operations since the ceasefire in Gaza (Oct. 11), while 61 percent of all health service clinics remain nonfunctional. The Debris Management Working Group reports that Gaza faces an immense recovery challenge, with over 80 percent of buildings damaged or destroyed. Debris also poses significant health and environmental hazards, often contaminated with explosives, asbestos, industrial by-products and medical waste.
West Bank: The UN remains “concerned” about operations by Israeli forces in the northern governorates of Tubas and Jenin that have occurred in recent days amid reports of displacement, insecurity, destruction of water networks and the closure of several commercial structures. Over 95,000 Palestinians were affected by expanded operations by Israeli forces in the northern areas in recent days.
Monday, Dec. 1
• Spokesperson’s briefing: Secretary-General António Guterres introduced to the General Assembly’s Fifth (budget) Committee the revised estimates report on the UN’s proposed 2026 peacekeeping budget (factoring in the UN80’s reform measures), saying that funding for 2026 will total $3.238 billion — a $577 million reduction compared with the 2025 budget. The proposed amount of approved staff — 11,594 posts — marks an 18.8 percent cut compared with 2025, while proposed reductions for special political missions feature a net decrease of $84.7 million due to the closure of missions and a net decrease of $64.8 million for continuing missions.
Guterres also said the UN is facing its most-fragile money crisis in years, despite sharp cuts built into next year’s budget plans. “Liquidity remains fragile, and this challenge will persist regardless of the final budget approved,” he said, pointing to the “unacceptable volume of arrears” owed by member states, with the US topping the list. The UN ended 2024 with $760 million in unpaid assessments, most of it still outstanding, and has yet to receive $877 million in contributions due for 2025, totaling $1.586 billion.
US remarks to the Assembly committee, Dec. 3, on streamlining UN mandates and other work while ignoring its own unpaid mandatory dues: “Every program, every mandate, every line of the budget should be judged against one simple test: is it delivering the results we expect, and is it still needed?,” said Jeff Bartos, representative for UN management and reform.
Tuesday, Dec. 2
• Spokesperson’s briefing: UN spokesperson Stéphane Dujarric said the UN remained “deeply concerned” about “continued breaches of the ceasefire” and the “continued presence and activities of the Israel Defense Forces” in the buffer zone between Israel and Syria, violating the “territorial integrity and sovereignty” of Syria and the 1974 Disengagement Agreement.
Wednesday, Dec. 3
• Spokesperson’s briefing: A new report by the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) says poppy cultivation in Myanmar is at a 10-year high after a 17 percent increase since last harvest season, making country the world’s main known source of illicit opium, surpassing Afghanistan.
• Lieut. Gen. Ganesh Kumar Shrestha of Nepal named force commander of UNISFA, succeeding Major Gen.Robert Yaw Affram of Ghana.
• Jack Christofides, former director of the UN Department of Political and Peacebuilding Affairs, named special representative of the Gang Suppression Force in Haiti.
Thursday, Dec. 4
• Spokesperson’s briefing: The UN humanitarian country team in Sudan condemned the escalating violence across Kordofan State and “ongoing sieges that have cut off multiple cities,” trapping people in Dilling and Kadugli and subjecting them to “extreme hardship, severe restrictions on movement and limited access to essential services and protection,” as famine emerges in Kadugli. On Dec. 5, Unicef said that drone strikes in Kalogi, South Kordofan, reportedly killed more than 10 children inside a kindergarten. Additionally, a Dec. 4 attack on a World Food Program truck near the town of Hamra El Sheikh in North Darfur, left eight people dead. The truck was part of a 39-member convoy en route with food to camps in Tawilah, North Darfur.
Friday, Dec. 5
• Spokesperson’s briefing: As the Lebanese army continues “operations to control unauthorized weapons and infrastructure” in the south, where the UN peacekeeping mission in Lebanon (UNIFIL) is based, it observed Israeli airstrikes in the area, Dujarric said, calling the attacks “clear violations” of Security Council Resolution 1701. The Security Council was scheduled to visit the mission on Friday. UNIFIL is slated to shut down at the end of 2026, after the US pushed for its closing through a Council resolution earlier this year.
• Guterres “welcomes the official signing yesterday in Washington of the Washington accords for peace and prosperity between the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Rwanda, under the facilitation of the United States of America.”
ICYMI:
• Women: Nothing Can Ever Justify a Digital Witch Hunt, essay by Kristina Lunz, Center for Feminist Foreign Policy
• Women: Using AI to End FGM, UNFPA/Unicef program
• US/South Africa: Trump is not inviting South Africa to the G20 summit in Miami next year, State Department announcement
• UN SecGen: “Navigating the Next Secretary-General Selection” NYU Center on International Cooperation video
• Weapons: Top 100 Arms Producing and Military Services Companies 2024, SIPRI report
• AI: The Next Great Divergence: Why AI May Widen Inequalities Between Countries, UNDP report on Asia/Pacific
• Oceans: Deep-Sea Mining Watch, new University of California, Santa Barbara, monitoring site
Arthur Bassas is a researcher and writer who graduated from St. Andrews in Scotland, majoring in international relations and terrorism. He lives in Brooklyn, N.Y., and speaks English and French.
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