Written by: Gray Southon, Special Officer for UN Reform, United Nations Association of New Zealand

I would like to address the current crisis in the UN which is threatening to terminate the funding of the Secretariat at the end of the month.

A common agreement in September last year to increase the efficiency and effectiveness of the Secretariat has been transformed to a destructive conflict between the developed and undeveloped countries. The first have turned their determination to force rapid action into a threat to the secretariat's survival, thus destabilising it and  degrading its capabilities. The second have reverted to a determination to maintain their detailed control on the secretariat through the 5th committee, for fear of losing power to the first.

This surely represents a fundamental failure of diplomacy. How is it that our diplomats have allowed the situation to sink this far??