UNITED NATIONS - / www.MaximsNews.com/ Stockholm - 28 March 2006 - This year a new Secretary-General of the UN is to be elected. The speculations are already in full swing. 

No Asian has had the post since U Thant succeeded Dag Hammarskjold in 1962 and there are already quite a number of Asian names in the air. Many think it is high time that the female half of humanity should provide the next UN leader.  

Tryggve Lie, who was the first Secretary-General of the UN, welcomed his successor, Dag Hammarskjold, to “the world’s most impossible job”. Although the description has become more true every year, there has never been a lack of persons willing to take the job. 

The first important qualification: to be able to get the support of each of the five permanent members of the Security Council: China , France , Russia , the UK and the US . 

Anyone able to pass through that needle’s eye is likely to get the support of the whole Council and of the General Assembly. The speculations are therefore often about who might get the support of the great powers, notably that of the United States . 

Boutros Ghali was not reelected in 1996 although he had fourteen votes. The fifteenth vote – that of the US – went against him.  

While the elections of the “secular pope” are not quite as secretive as those in the Vatican they are not characterized by much openness. Hammarskjold is said not to have known he was a candidate until the great powers had reached agreement on him! 

The views and past life of a candidate are not scrutinized in detail at public hearings as is done for high officials in the European Union or the United States . Perhaps a similar procedure ought to be introduced.

When Kurt Waldheim was launched as a candidate to become the President of Austria after having served for ten years as the Secretary-General, his role in the UN was exploited. He was advertised as ‘a man in whom the world has confidence’. 

However, during the election campaign in Austria his previous past as a member of the German occupation force in Yugoslavia during the Second World War became public and international criticism mounted. A poster with a new text was distributed: “We Austrians elect whom we want.” 

The sentences were excellent lessons in German grammar but the more profound lesson was that it should be thoroughly examined what candidates to the post as Secretary-General of the UN have done before they reached such high positions that they could aspire to be head of the UN.  

There has been a practice to let the post rotate among the continents, which results in a shortlist of sorts. However, US officials have asserted that the current choice is by no means limited to Asians and there is a suspicion that they are looking for candidates from Eastern European and Baltic states . 

They might hope that these states, which have never filled the post and have recent experience of liberation from authoritarian rule, might present candidates, who look with some understanding on recent US foreign policy – including the invasion of Iraq .  

In any case, the names of Aleksander Kwasniewski, a former President of Poland , and Vaira Vike-Freiberga, a former President of Latvia and a woman, are in the present guess lists.

My gut feeling points to an Asian. China and Russia will give preference to Asia this time and unless the Asians squander their chances by internal fighting it would be somewhat embarrassing for the US to block an Asian. 

Of course, we remember how in the lead up to the war in Iraq US Defense Secretary Rumsfeld praised the “new Europe” (the states emancipated from the former Soviet Union) and referred disparagingly to the “old Europe ” (that did not support the war). 

However, the US government might not wish today to hurt the strong Asian pride that flows from the continent’s rapidly increasing economic and political weight. 

The wife of one of the former Secretary-Generals told me that she was once asked what “the General” thought about a particular political problem. “Which General”, she asked. “Your husband, of course.  I cannot call him just secretary…” 

Perhaps the story points to what is most important in the coming election. Are we to have a general or a secretary?

Kofi Annan, who emerged from the ranks of the secretaries, proved to be an extremely wise and courageous Secretary-General. He used his unique position as an independent global opinion leader sparingly and never lecturing. 

But he consistently sought to advance the goals of the UN Charter and did not shy away from saying that the US invasion of Iraq violated the Charter. 

I am certain that most people in the world want a Secretary-General who seeks to bridge differences in the global turmoil but also dares to stand up for the rule of law and is not on the leash of any great power or group of states. In Washington, I suspect, they would prefer a secretary. They have no lack of generals.

         HansBlix@MaximsNews.com

Other MaximsNews Columns by Hans Blix

The Next Secretary-General of the United Nations

Iran Nuclear Threat?

Did They Lie?

The UN and Arms Control

Weapons of Mass Destruction, Challenges Ahead...

Weapons of Mass Destruction, Terrorism, Global Security

Nuclear Weapons and Terrorists

About Hans Blix

Dr. Hans Blix was born in 1928 in Uppsala, Sweden. He studied at the University of Uppsala; at Columbia University, where he was also a research graduate; and at Cambridge University, where he received his Ph.D.

In 1959, he became Doctor of Laws at the Stockholm University, and in 1960, was appointed Associate Professor in International Law.

He has an Honorary Doctorate from Moscow State University (1987) and is a recipient of the Henry de Wolf Smyth Award (Washington, DC, 1988).

From 1963 to 1976, Dr. Blix was Head of Department at the Ministry for Foreign Affairs and served as Legal Adviser on International Law.  In 1976, he became Under-Secretary of State at the Ministry for Foreign Affairs, in charge of international development cooperation.  He was appointed Minister for Foreign Affairs in October 1978.

From 1961 until 1981, he was a member of Sweden's delegation to the United Nations General Assembly; and from 1962 to 1978, a member of the Swedish delegation to the Conference on Disarmament in Geneva.

He served as Director General of the International Atomic Energy Agency from 1981 to 1997.

He has written several books on subjects associated with international and constitutional law and was a leader of the Liberal Campaign Committee in favour of retention of the Swedish nuclear energy programme in the referendum in 1980.

Dr. Blix was appointed to by the UN Secretary-General in January 2000 and took up his duties on 1 March 2000.  He is now the former Executive Chairman of United Nations Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission (UNMOVIC) .

Currently Hans Blix is the Chairman, Weapons of Mass Destruction Commission and Director-General Emeritus of the IAEA.

Dr. Hans Blix is a Columnist for MaximsNews Network.

Publisher's Note: To read excerpts and to purchase Dr. Blix’s book, see Disarming Iraq.