Louis Charbonneau is the United Nations Director of Human Rights Watch
The biggest cuts and delays in payment amidst conflict and unrest test the very principles and frameworks in which international human rights infrastructure was built nearly 80 years ago.
With human rights needing more defensive than ever, UN leaders need to ensure that efforts to reduce costs do not endanger the UN’s critical human rights work.
The Trump administration’s review of the US involvement with multilateral organizations and its refusal to pay assessed UN contributions, which account for 22% of the UN’s regular budget, has driven cash-bound international organizations into a full-fledged financial crisis.
China, the second biggest contributor, continues to pay, but delays payments, exacerbating the UN’s long-standing liquidity crisis. With widespread layoffs looming, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres was forced to dig deeper into cost-cutting measures.
The six-page memo seen in Human Rights Watch, marked “Structural Changes and Program Reorganization of UN80” and as “Strictly Confidential” and outlines proposals to eliminate redundancy and unnecessary costs across the United Nations.
The proposals include integrating obviously overlapping missions, reducing the presence of the United Nations in expensive places like New York City, and reducing some advanced posts.
Some UN80 proposals have benefits, but the human rights section is concerned. It suggests downgrades and reductions in several senior human rights posts, and the fusion of various activities. However, as the rights crisis is rising and populist leaders are expanding against rights, the reduction in the UN’s human rights capabilities is short-sighted.
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Efficiency and cost-effectiveness are important, but for a long time, the UN’s human rights work has been severely underfunded and understaffed. The Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights has earned just 5% of the usual UN budget.
Countless lives rely on their investigation and surveillance, and help to stop abuse in places that are often ignored or inaccessible. Investigating war crimes and other atrocities in places such as Sudan, Ukraine, Israel/Palestine has already struggled amidst the freeze before the freeze and the liquidity shortage before Trump.
For years, Russia and China have worked to reimburse the UN’s human rights work. There is a risk that the US, which is currently blocking its own funding for human rights around the world, will no longer oppose these efforts and will instead make them possible.
During these efforts, the United Nations should remind the world that decades of commitment to human rights is unwavering.
IPS UN Bureau
