Too little cash, too much politics, leaves UNESCO fighting for life

Reuters: 'Too little cash, too much politics, leaves UNESCO fighting for life'

In the modernist but faded headquarters of UNESCO, the U.N.’s cultural agency on Paris’s elegant Left Bank, more than a few diplomats wandered the corridors on Friday wondering if the organisation has a future. The agency, founded in the ashes of World War Two to protect the common cultural inheritance of humanity, was due to elect a new head later in the day. But a sudden announcement that the United States was quitting over anti-Israel bias meant that whoever wins the top job would inherit a body in turmoil, with huge questions over its future funding and mission.[...] For some of its diplomats, Washington’s decision to quit represented a corner being turned, and puts even more pressure on whoever is elected to lead it. “This is the most critical election. There can’t be four more years like this,” said a Western diplomat, bemoaning the leadership of outgoing director Irina Bokova of Bulgaria, whose critics say she failed to persuade member states to pay their dues and stop politicizing UNESCO’s work.[...]

Without U.S. money, UNESCO, which employs around 2,000 people worldwide, has been forced to cut programmes, freeze hiring and fill gaps with voluntary contributions. Its 2017 budget was about $326 million, almost half its 2012 budget.  Including the United States, which has some $542 million in arrears, the organisation is owed almost $650 million, according to figures on its website. At this stage, UNESCO officials still don’t know if the United States will make up its arrears before it officially exits on Dec. 31, 2018.

Other major contributors such as Japan, Britain, and Brazil have also yet to pay their dues for 2017, sometimes citing objections to the body’s policies. “The fact is that UNESCO was all about solidarity and creating a climate for peace between countries, but nations now use their dues to influence programmes,” said a UNESCO-based diplomat. “That needs to change.” Japan, for example, has threatened to withhold dues over the inclusion of the 1937 Nanjing Massacre in the body’s “Memory of the World” programme. Russia and Ukraine have been at odds over Crimea, with Kiev accusing Moscow of trying to legitimise its annexation of the territory through UNESCO. “Whoever takes over at the helm has to tackle this head on. They need to find ways of getting nations to talk these issues through, but if they can‘t, then the director-general needs to be able to say ‘no’ and kill these texts,” said a second UNESCO-based diplomat. Unlike at the U.N. Security Council, where five powers wield a veto, UNESCO takes decisions based on majority votes, either of its General Secretariat that includes all 195 nations, or of the 58-member Executive Board. Israel says this creates a built-in majority for states that are hostile to it. Big countries like the United States that provide most of the funding say their single votes give them little input into how their money is spent.