World Powers Clash at UN Meeting       09/23 06:12

   

   UNITED NATIONS (AP) -- Kept apart by a devastating pandemic and dispersed 
across the globe, world leaders convened electronically Tuesday for an 
unprecedented high-level meeting, where the U.N. chief exhorted them to unite 
and tackle the era's towering problems: the coronavirus, the "economic 
calamity" it unleashed and the risk of a new Cold War between the United States 
and China.

   As Secretary-General Antonio Guterres opened the first virtual "general 
debate" of the U.N. General Assembly, the yawning gaps of politics and anger 
became evident. China and Iran clashed with the United States --- via 
prerecorded videos from home --- and leaders expressed frustration and anger at 
the handling of the COVID-19 pandemic, which the U.N. chief has called "the 
number one global security threat in our world today."

   As he began his speech, the secretary-general looked out at the vast General 
Assembly chamber, where only one mask-wearing diplomat from each of the U.N.'s 
193 member nations was allowed to sit, socially distanced from one another.

   "The COVID-19 pandemic has changed our annual meeting beyond recognition," 
Guterres said. "But it has made it more important than ever."

   While the six-day mainly virtual meeting is unique in the U.N.'s 75-year 
history, the speeches from leaders hit on all the conflicts, crises and 
divisions facing a world that Guterres said is witnessing "rising inequalities, 
climate catastrophe, widening societal divisions, rampant corruption."

   In his grim state of the world speech, he said "the pandemic has exploited 
these injustices, preyed on the most vulnerable and wiped away the progress of 
decades," including sparking the first rise in poverty in 30 years.

   The secretary-general called for global unity, foremost to fight the 
pandemic, and sharply criticized populism and nationalism for failing to 
contain the virus and for often making things worse.

   Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan criticized how "countries were left 
on their own" at the onset of the pandemic, stressing that "effective 
multilateralism requires effective multilateral institutions." He urged rapid 
U.N. reforms, starting with the Security Council, the most powerful body with 
five veto-wielding members --- the U.S., China, Russia, Britain and France.

   By contrast, Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, whose country has reported 
the second-highest coronavirus death toll after the U.S., trumpeted his focus 
on the economy in dealing with the pandemic.

   Bolsonaro lambasted "segments of the Brazilian media" for "spreading panic" 
by encouraging stay-at-home orders and prioritizing public health over the 
economy. He's downplayed the severity of the coronavirus and repeatedly said 
shutting down the economy would inflict worse hardship on people.

   Guterres told the virtual audience that "too often, there has also been a 
disconnect between leadership and power."

   A year ago, he warned about the rising U.S.-China rivalry, saying Tuesday: 
"We are moving in a very dangerous direction."

   "Our world cannot afford a future where the two largest economies split the 
globe in a great fracture --- each with its own trade and financial rules and 
internet and artificial intelligence capacities," Guterres said. "We must avoid 
this at all costs."

   The rivalry between the two powers was in full display as President Donald 
Trump, in a very short virtual speech, urged the United Nations to hold Beijing 
"accountable" for failing to contain the virus that originated in the Chinese 
city of Wuhan and has killed over 200,000 Americans and nearly 1 million 
worldwide.

   China's ambassador rejected all accusations against Beijing as "totally 
baseless."

   "At this moment, the world needs more solidarity and cooperation, and not a 
confrontation," U.N. Ambassador Zhang Jun said before introducing President Xi 
Jinping's prerecorded speech. "We need to increase mutual confidence and trust, 
and not the spreading of political virus."

   French President Emmanuel Macron said the pandemic should be "an electric 
shock" to encourage more multilateral action. Otherwise, he warned, the world 
will be "collectively condemned to a pas de deux" by the U.S. and China in 
which everyone else is "reduced to being nothing but the sorry spectators of a 
collective impotence."

   Tensions with the U.S. also dominated a fiery speech by Iranian President 
Hassan Rouhani, whose country is facing the worst COVID-19 crisis in the Middle 
East. He lashed out at U.S. sanctions but declared that his country will not 
submit to U.S. pressure.

   Rouhani said the United States can't impose negotiations or war on Iran, 
stressing that his country is "not a bargaining chip in U.S. elections and 
domestic policy." He used the May death of Black American George Floyd under 
the knee of a white Minneapolis police officer as a metaphor for Iran's "own 
experience" with the United States.

   "We instantly recognize the feet kneeling on the neck as the feet of 
arrogance on the neck of independent nations," Rouhani said.

   U.S.-Iran tensions have run dangerously high this year, and Trump signed an 
executive order this week to enforce all U.N. sanctions on Iran because it's 
not complying with a 2015 nuclear deal with world powers --- a move he touted 
in his U.N. speech but that most of the world rejects as illegal.

   Similarly, Russian President Vladimir Putin stressed the need for 
multilateral cooperation against the pandemic, urging an end to "illegitimate 
sanctions" against his country and others that he said could boost the global 
economy and create jobs.

   South African President Cyril Ramaphosa, speaking on behalf of the African 
Union, said rich nations haven't been generous enough in helping developing 
countries combat COVID-19, which is setting back the continent's economy and 
development.

   After the pandemic shut down big parts of the world in March, Guterres 
called for a global cease-fire to tackle it. On Tuesday, he appealed for a 
100-day push by the international community, led by the Security Council, "to 
make this a reality by the end of the year."

   Amid widespread calls for U.N. reforms, France's Macron said the global body 
itself "ran the risk of impotence."

   "Our societies have never been so interdependent," he said. "And at the very 
moment when all this is happening, never have we been so out of tune, so out of 
alignment."