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Happy New Year everyone! And what an interesting an exciting year this will be for the United Nations because the new year marks the semi-official kickoff of the race to select the next UN secretary general.Ban Ki Moon's second and final term expires at the end of the year and now it is up to the world--or, i should say more specifically the Security Council with input from the General Assembly--to find his replacement.
On the line with me to discuss the likely candidates for the next secretary general and the diplomatic intrigue that will surround this whole process and provide a great deal of subtext for diplomacy at the UN this year is Richard Gowan. If you are a regular listener to this podcast you'll be well aquatinted with richard, I believe this is this his third time of the show. He is a fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations and the Center for International Cooperation and teaches at Colombia. He's also out with a new piece in The American Interest taking a look at US priorities at the UN during Obama's last year in office. and at the end of this conversation we discuss that piece. But we kick off and devote most of this episode to the big question of who will replace Ban Ki Moon and how that selection will be made. And start by discussing what's known in UN circles as the so-called "Bulgarian Primary"Named by The Guardian as a "podcast to make you smarter" Global Dispatches is an international affairs podcast with impact.
The Paris agreement that was adopted on December 12 was a triumph of diplomacy. It is also a affirmation of idealism in international relations -- that the anarchy of the international system can be transcended to find global solutions to global problems. And the fact international community found a way to push the needle in the right direction on as complex an issue as climate change makes other global challenges suddenly seem a little less daunting. The Paris Agreement itself is profoundly inventive document. On the line to discuss some of the finer points of contention in the agreement, how they were resolved and why certain countries like India played a key role in crafting final outcome, is Neil Bhatiya, a policy associate with the Century Foundation. We discuss some of key questions that the agreement addresses, like how can the international community verify compliance with the accord and how the question of so-called "climate finance" will work. We also discuss the role of the United States in helping shape the final outcome. If you are fascinated by diplomacy, want a closer look at the big issues that were up for negotiation and understand what comes next, have a listen!
After Syrians and Afghans, the largest nationality of people who are fleeing as refugees to Europe are Eritreans. And the vast majority of Eritreans who are fleeing to Europe are young people between the ages of 18 and 24 who are escaping an oppressive system of compulsory national service.
National service itself is not a problem. Lots of liberal democracies have some of draft or conscription. But the System of national service in Eritrea takes this to the extreme and has become a system of forced labor and population control. Amnesty International recently published a report called Just Deserters: Why Indefinite National Service in Eritrea has Created Generation of Refugees that explores in depth the human rights abuses of this system and its implications for global security. On the line with me today is the report's lead author Claire Beston. We discuss how this system works, why so many young Eritreans are fleeing the country, and why countries in Europe are turning a blind eye to this major driver of refugees to their shore. This is a very interesting conversation about how policy decisions by one small and brutally repressive government can have profound repercussions around the world.Emma Sky was an Arabist, working at the British Council in 2003 when the United Kingdom joined the US led invasion and occupation of Iraq. Though she strongly opposed the war, she opted to join the coalition provisional authority, which administered Iraq after the fall of Saddam. Here's why She served as the top coalition official in the-oil rich and ethnically diverse province of Kirkuk, and later returned to Iraq as the top civilian advisor to advisor to general Ray Odierno as they managed what's now known as the Sunni Awakening. She tells stories from those experiences in the episode you are about to hear. She also has them down in her new memoir called The Unraveling. Sky had an unusual upringin. She was raised by a single mom who worked at an all boys school. So young emma sky's formative years very much included being the only girl in the room, and she discusses how that experience affected her later on in life. We kick off with a discussion about the current state of affairs in Iraq and Syria, before pivoting to a longer discussion about her life and career, which includes a long stint in Israel at the height of the peace process in the 1990s and its unraveling.
Unlike any other global climate or environment conference I've covered over the years, civil society and the activist community this time around is genuinely enthused about the Paris Climate Talks. Cautious optimism, or at the very least, not gloom and doom, seems to be prevailing mood.
I asked the leader of one of the most important and largest global climate activist organizations, May Boeve of 350.org, why that is. And her reply is interesting and telling. May says that we are in the midst of a political tipping point in the international debate about climate change and Paris is one manifestation of this historic moment. I caught up with May while she was in Paris during the first week of the talks, and we discusses some of the issues she was following closely as the talks enter a more technical phase. But we have a longer conversation about the role of activism in bringing delegates to this point and what the activist community has planned for after paris. For those of you interested in the particulars on the Paris talks, you will be sure to get a lot out of this conversation. But even if you are less interested in the minutia of climate politics, this episode offers a fascinating insight into the role of civil society and activisms in shaping the outcome of a major international negotiation. The role of civil society in the Paris climate talks is sure to be the subject of PhD thesis for decades to come. This conversation shows you why.My guest today Katie Meyler is the founder of the NGO More than Me, which provides schooling and counseling to adolescent girls in Monrovia, Liberia. Katie founded the NGO in 2009, but during the Ebola outbreak last year it transformed into a community hub in the West Point neighborhood of Monrovia, which was the hardest hit neighborhood in the hardest hit city in the hardest hit country by the outbreak. And we have a powerful discussion of why she opted to stay put in Liberia during the Ebola crisis, even though she became symptomatic. And how she dealt with all the death and despair that was surrounding her. Katie grew up poor in a very wealthy town in New Jersey and she discusses how service trips with her church first exposed her to extreme poverty around the world. She tells an ultimately inspiring story about the founding of More than Me and how with the partnership of the government of Liberia, she is trying to replicate the success of More than Me in other parts of the country. We kick off though, discussing a new resurgence of Ebola in Liberia several months after the country was declared Ebola free.
Could the horrible attack in Paris might provide the kind of exogenous shock to the international system that could unstick international diplomacy on Syria and move the needle in right direction? After a key meeting in Vienna of the USA, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Iran and all the relevant regional players it would appear that there is finally some movement on the diplomatic front.
Here with me to discuss the diplomatic implications of the paris attacks is Ambassador Christopher Hill. He is the former US Ambassador to Iraq (among many other places) and was a lead US negotiator during the Balkan conflict. He's now the Dean of the Korbel school at the University of Denver and was on Episode 29 of this very podcast to discuss his life, career, and his memoir Outpost. I caught up with Ambassador Hill just as he was leaving for Dayton, Ohio to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the Dayton peace accords which ended the Balkan civil wars. We have a very interesting conversation about the kinds of lessons that can be drawn from the Dayton experience and applied to international diplomacy on Syria.James P Grant is not a household name. But he most certainly should be. Grant lead UNICEF from 1979 until his death in 1995, and as Nick Kristof once wrote he "probably saved more lives than were destroyed by Hitler, Stalin and Mao combined." He was a force in the UN bureaucracy and on the international stage. And now, for the first time, there is a full accounting of his life and work in the new biography titled "A Mighty Purpose: How UNICEF's James P Grant Sold the World on Saving Its Children."
On the line with me to discuss Grant is his biographer, Adam Fifield. Fifield describes how Grant spearheaded what is now known as the "child survival revolution" in the 1980s that lead to, among other things, the quadrupling of worldwide childhood immunization rates." And Fiefield vividly describes how Grant accomplished this achievement and many others on behalf of children of the world, often times through sheer force of nature.The Paris Climate talks kick off in just a few short weeks. On November 30, president Obama and many other heads of state are going to start weeks of negotiations that if all goes according to plan, will usher in a new kind of international climate change regime. These talks a huge deal for diplomacy and for the planet. On the line with me to discuss the contours of the talks, expected outcomes, diplomatic intriguies and possible speed bumps along the way is Elliot Diringer, executive vice president of the Center for Climate and Energy Solutions
For those of you who are less steeped in the complexities of climate diplomacy, this episode is a useful primer to the Paris talks. But as our conversation progresses we go deeper and deeper into the weeds, so there's good fodder for you climate wonks as well.
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