Valdai Club

On November 22, the Valdai Club hosted an expert discussion dedicated to the role of the UN in the changing world order.

The UN Charter was signed on June 26, 1945 in San Francisco. In 78 years, the world has changed a lot. The UN is slow to respond to modern challenges: be it a pandemic or climate change. The conflict in the Middle East and Russia’s special military operation in Ukraine also revealed shortcomings in the decision-making mechanism within the UN General Assembly. The organisation’s crisis is compounded by the fact that Western countries can still use their dominance of the UN secretariat and UN-affiliated organisations to advance their position.

Moreover, attempts are being made to replace the platform of the United Nations with ad hoc coalitions, and international law with a so-called “rules-based order.” Nevertheless, the UN remains a unique platform for discussing global challenges and resolving crises. At the 78^th session of the General Assembly, US President Joe Biden reiterated that he would seek UN reform and increase the number of permanent and non-permanent members of the Security Council. Russia also advocates the reform of the Organisation, but is concerned about the United States’ intent to bring countries loyal to it into the Security Council.

Russian President Vladimir Putin insists that developing countries such as India, Brazil and South Africa should be made permanent members of the UN Security Council. In his speech at the plenary session of the 20^th Annual Meeting of the Valdai Discussion Club, the Russian leader called for preserving international law based on the UN Charter and “following the path of permanent gradual changes”: “If we consign the UN Charter to the dustbin of history without replacing it with anything new, the inevitable ensuing chaos will lead to extremely serious consequences."

How adequate is the United Nations to modern challenges and threats? What is its fate in the changing world order? How could the debate on the Security Council reform end? What role will Russia play in the current process as a founding country? Participants in the discussion tried to answer these and other questions.

Speakers:

• Alexey Borisov, Secretary General, Russian Association for the United Nations, Vice-President of the World Federation of UN Associations

• Vladimir Chernigov, President of the Social and Industrial Foodservice Institute and of the ANO “For School Nutrition”

• Çağrı Erhan, Rector of Altinbash University

• Vladimir Grachev, Head of the Expert Council on Geopolitics of the Just World Institute, Senior Advisor to the Executive Office of the UN Secretary-General (1997–2003), Director of the Conference Management Office of the UN Office in Geneva (2006–2014)

• Mikatekiso Kubayi, Researcher at the Institute for Global Dialogue at UNISA, Research Fellow at the Institute of Pan-African Thought and Dialogue (South Africa)

• Vladimir Kuznetsov, Director of United Nations Information Centre in Moscow

• Asoke Kumar Mukerji, Permanent Representative of India to the UN (2013-2014), Honorary Fellow of the Vivekananda International Foundation

Moderator:

• Andrey Sushentsov, Programme Director of the Valdai Discussion Club

Working languages: Russian, English.