Ban wins.

Tony has all the details over at UNSG.org.

American Right attacks Ban as corrupt

If Ban is selected, we can expect to hear more attacks like this over the next 5 years.

One pundit, Alykhan Velshi calls Ban “a crook”. Velshi works at the same think tank as Claudia Rosset, a reporter who has attacked the UN over the Oil for Food “scandal”.

Another says that Ban will be more “general than secretary” and claims that Ban will put little work in to address corruption.

Regardless of the merits of the allegations against Ban, the allegations themselves will create a ready excuse for US conservatives to attack the UN.

Dhanapala’s comments on race

Jayantha Dhanapala has made several comments on the race worth considering:

“Naturally, one is disappointed that the international community did not recognise my experience and qualifications, which were readily conceded by everybody,” Dhanapala told the Sunday Island, on his return to Sri Lanka. “It seems to me that decisions (at the Security Council) are more politics-based than merit-based… and I think analysing the politics of it must wait a while.”

“I am content that we conducted a very professional, dignified, ethics-based and low-budget campaign focusing on my merits as a candidate,” he added. “A withdrawal at this stage was the right thing to do at the right moment in the interest of securing a consensus around an Asian candidate, which has been our principled position from the beginning.”

Is that a point of contrast?

Ban attempting coup de grace

It appears that Ban Ki-moon is rolling out the endorsements prior to Monday’s colored straw poll, presenting himself as Asia’s consensus candidate.

Sri Lankan press is reporting that Dhanapala and Sri Lanka are throwing support behind Ban.

AP is reporting that Japan will endorse at an upcoming event.  The Japanese Foreign Minister has been quoted as saying:

Assuming a summit meeting can be arranged, (Japan’s endorsement) would be offered at that point.

The only question at this point is who the sole discourage vote was on Thursday’s straw poll and whether more will occur as a consequence of allegations of corruption or improprieties in the way that Ban has fought the campaign.  Speculation is that the UK was responsible for the “discourage” as a delaying tactic. There is a chance that the news stories may solidify that, further encouraging more candidates, which has been the standard line of the UK and the US.

Tomorrow will be quite interesting.

Dhanapala Withdraws: Now it is 6

From ColomboPage.com:

Following the results of the third ‘straw poll’ in the election of the Secretary-General conducted by the members of the Security Council on Thursday 28 September 2006, the Government of Sri Lanka – with the total agreement of its candidate – has now decided not to further pursue the candidature of Ambassador Jayantha Dhanapala in the interest of ensuring a consensus in electing an Asian candidate.

Ban’s trips and aid: A summary

The following posts describe BanKi-moon’s travel and aid as we have covered them:

• Increase in total aid by a substantial amount in the years immediately preceding Ban’s candidacy.
• Undisclosed amount of money to Ghana. (here and here)
• Meeting with Congo-Brazzaville. Although we have been told that Congo refused money.
• Tanzania. (Now) Widely reported on. $18m in aid.
• Ban to Slovakia. He promised support. Recent news reports indicate that a Korean firm invested massively there.
• Uzbekistan.  $30m in ICT.

Other people have reported:

• A maritime agreement with Greece.
• A piano for Peru.

We have heard of others but have no documentation. We do not want to make suggestions about the integrity of heads of state without at least documentary evidence.

Times of London reports on Ban’s vote buying

Update: The Indian press has picked up on this too and going into their typical feeding frenzy.

We have said that this is an extremely important issue and deserves a higher level of scrutiny. Now a mainstream newspaper has documented the charges. The basic framing is:

Mr Ban announced his bid in February and has since been criss-crossing the globe trying to win support. A month later South Korea announced that it would treble its aid budget to Africa to $100 million (£53 million) by 2008. Seoul then contributed tens of thousands of pounds to sponsor this year’s African Union summit in the Gambia in July, when Mr Ban declared 2006 to be “the Year of Africa” for South Korea.

Then the article discusses Tanzania. This is one of the clearest cases that we have discussed:

One fortunate recipient was Tanzania, which currently has a seat on the Security Council. When Mr Ban arrived in May he pledged $18 million for an educational programme and also promised to carry out a road and bridge project in western Tanzania. Between 1991 and 2003 South Korean grants to Tanzania totalled $4.7 million. Seoul’s generosity seems to have worked. Yesterday Elly Matango, the Tanzanian Ambassador to Tokyo and Seoul, said that his Government had decided to support Mr Ban

Next stop Greece:

This month President Roh and Mr Ban headed the most senior South Korean delegation since 1961 to visit Greece, another Security Council member. Overseen by hundreds of South Korean businessmen, the countries signed agreements on trade, tourism and maritime transport.

It is about time that the media gives this race proper scrutiny. We believe that more examples are out there and need to be properly discussed and identified. In many countries, this kind of behavior would disqualify a candidate for public office and open them to criminal prosecution. We have trouble seeing how a candidate that acts like this has any credibility leading the UN.

This is important because it provides the US and UK a reason to veto Ban while also undermining the credibility of the UN. Conservatives in the US especially will use this as another reason to distrust the UN.

Thoughts on Straw Poll Results

UNSG has the results. We will compare with the results of the 2nd round. Some observations

• Ban did lose one encouragement to a “no opinion”. We assume that this is either the US or the UK, given their current statements.
• Shashi Tharoor lost two encouragements to “no opinion”. Who is softening.
• The Latvian did well. We can assume that her support is the 5 Europeans and the US. One more could include Japan. This is a strong performance but completely explicable. Indeed, the real question for her is how to increase her support. We do not believe it is possible without a fundamental restructuring of the race. In any case, what is she after?
• Zeid, Surakiart Sathirathai, and Dhanapala have failed as candidates. They should get out and stop wasting their countries’ time and money. Sathirathai or Dhanapala exits might open the possibility of other entrances.
• It is too early to tell about Ghani, but we have trouble imagining him go anywhere.

The real questions to be answered at this point are:

1. Can Ban be stopped? There are two scenarios where he would not be selected. Ultimately, they both probably must occur.
   • A better candidate emerges. A new ASEAN candidate could introduce this scenario.
   • A fault emerges that gives the US and UK (probably need both) to sustain the diplomatic pressure associated with vetoes. We believe that evidence of vote buying could, under some circumstances, be this issue.
2. What is Shashi Tharoor trying to get out of this? We have recently heard the theory that he is really running for Foreign Minister of India, where the UNSG race is a gambit to increase Indian leverage for a UNSC permanent seat. In essence, they would stop pushing Tharoor to in exchange for Chinese (and Russian?) commitments to support India’s seat.
3. What is the Latvian trying to get out of this? We do not have a theory for this yet.

We look forward to seeing how this evolves.

Washington Post Columnist Questions Ban for US

The Washington Post’s columnist Jim Hoagland:

That warning of the dangers of answered prayers applies particularly to President Bush and his support for Ban Ki Moon, South Korea’s reliably stolid foreign minister, in the highly competitive race to succeed Kofi Annan at year’s end. Bush — pilloried by Third World radicals at last week’s General Assembly opening — may be picking up a lightning rod instead of a shield.

Hoagland reports that the US has committed, at some point, to withdraw its support for Shashi Tharoor:

A shift to voting only for Ban — a move that Bush indicated he would make to South Korean President Roh Moo Hyun at a White House meeting this month — would probably doom the hopes of Tharoor and the other candidates.

Hoagland also mentions our concerns about foreign aid:

South Korea’s generosity in foreign aid and investment decisions may work in Ban’s favor with some nations, it is said in diplomatic understatement in the corridors of the United Nations.

This article suggests that the deal is done. The UK could not sustain a veto unless there was a substantially better candidate.

South Korea to increase development assistance

The government of South Korea has announced that it will increase its foreign aid, according to AsiaNews:

Korea spent 0.06 per cent of its Gross National Income (GNI) in development assistance in 2004, which some say is too small for the size of its economy, the 12th largest in the world.

Although South Korea’s spending in development assistance rose to 0.09 percent of GNI last year, it is still far from the United Nations recommendation of 0.7 per cent of the economy.

After Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade Ban Ki-moon announced his run for the UN secretary-general’s position, it was pointed out that Korea should raise its development spending to improve its voice in the global community.

So a country has advanced their foreign minister to be UNSG and yet they barely participate in one of the most important parts of the UN agenda, development. And then the year before running for UNSG, they increase their aid by about 50%.

Now in March, South Korea announced that they were increasing aid to Africa by $100m:

South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun announced during his trip to Nigeria in March that his country will triple its Official Development Assistance budget for Africa to approximately US$100 million by 2008.

So what countries will receive this money? We know some. $18m was promised to Tanzania, a UNSC member. We know that more was promised to Ghana, another UNSC member. We have heard that substantial aid has been offered to other countries, but we have not been able to document this.

Note that this is not unheard of. A recent study out of Harvard University found that, “on average, a non-permanent member of the council enjoys a 59- per-cent increase in total aid from the United States and an 8-per- cent increase in total development aid from the United Nations.”

It would be interesting to know the country-by-country breakdown of recent increases in South Korean development assistance.