KOFI ANNAN - UNITED NATIONS SECRETARY GENERAL

I was greatly saddened this morning to learn of the death of Kofi Annan, former Secretary General of the United Nations. I knew Annan when I served on the Irish delegation to the UN Security Council, especially during my period as a Member of the (1373) Counter-Terrorism Committee and when I acted as United Nations counsel advising that Committee. Annan was an impressive personality, by any standard. He stood out in a crowd, not on account of his appearance or height (he was not especially tall), but because of his demeanour. Annan had the natural ease, courtesy and grace which befits a prince, and indeed in his native Ghana, he was a prince! He stood out at the United Nations and, especially, at the Security Council’s famous horseshoe-shaped table by his refusal to be intimidated by the major powers, in particular the Five Permanent Members of the Security Council. I once asked my chief, Ambassador Francis Mahon Hayes, how important was the UN Secretary-General. Mahon laughed before replying: “Less powerful than the President of the United States and less spiritual than the Pope”. I subsequently relayed Mahon’s observations to my Uncle Conor Cruise O’Brien. He also laughed and said “Your Ambassador wasn’t wrong, not wrong at all. No Secretary General can hope to cross swords with the President of the United States and win. But depending on his talents and the circumstances of his appointment, he can exercise great spiritual and moral authority throughout the international community!” Kofi Annan did just that. He came to the highest office at the United Nations, having had a difficult tenure as Head of the United Nations Peace Keeping Department. He was unfairly besmirched by that Department’s failure to prevent the massacre and genocide in Rwanda. (France and Belgium still have a lot of soul-searching to do concerning that very tragic affair!). When the Security Council decided that they had had enough of Boutros’ arrogant occupancy of the 17th Floor, and conscious that it was in all of their interests to improve the collective image of the United Nations, they turned to Kofi Annan. However, the international power-brokers soon discovered that the new Secretary General had no intention of acting as a PR agent for the P5. He saw himself, as he always had seen himself, as a man entrusted with the mission and responsibility of acting on behalf of Peace! This determination by the Secretary General was sorely and unpardonably challenged when George W Bush, Dick Cheney, Colin Powell and assorted “neo-Cons” decided that they wished to invade Iraq, for their own nefarious purposes, and in clear and flagrant breach of the United Nations Charter and the rules of customary international law. Tony Blair, that great and sincere Apostle of Peace, fresh from encroaching upon legality and the rule of Law in Northern Ireland, soon lined up the United Kingdom alongside the United States to take part in the illegal war. The result of all this “Shock and awe” was that a great many Americans and British servicemen died or were injured; but although the American and British media seldom mention this, far more Iraqis suffered and died, perhaps as many as a million of them. Franklin Roosevelt and Winston Churchill, the UN’s twin founding fathers, must have rolled over in their graves and recoiled in horror! It is to Kofi Annan’s eternal credit that he did not hesitate or lack the courage to publicly denounce on the international and world stage the illegality and the human cost of the US and British invasion of Iraq, the terrible consequences of which live on with us today! It took a man of real courage and stature to do that; and Kofi Annan was just such a man. I extend to his wife and family my sincere condolences and sympathy.

Maurice James, Barrister at Law, United Nations counsel