Ban Ki-Moon cancels again

[Photo by Kim Kyung-Hoon]

Nooo! Ban Ki-Moon’s UCLA Burkle Institute lecture on the Conditions of Peace is cancelled. I was really looking forward to this and spending a long weekend back at UCLA posing as a student. It’s the second time he’s cancelled but it was expected with the bloodbath that’s going on in Gaza right now.

Hopefully he can reschedule and give us an insider’s perspective on how it’s easy for the U.N. Security Council to condemn the violence and call for an immediate cease-fire, but difficult for the council to reach a consensus and intervene - especially because of the stubborn U.S. veto.

The U.N. Security Council is outdated. The international landscape has changed drastically since its initiation. Though it’s great that the council promotes diplomacy, it has no accountability when it comes to maintaining international peace and security if it’s subjugated by the veto power of its permanent members. I don’t think it should be removed altogether, but in order to be accountable and representative, it has to reorganize itself into regional blocs or include more permanent members and get rid of that dreaded veto.