UN Secretary-General Race Enters Final Stretch With 7 Candidates as July 30 Poll Signals Horse-Trading
Updated
Updated · The Wire · Aug 13
UN Secretary-General Race Enters Final Stretch With 7 Candidates as July 30 Poll Signals Horse-Trading
3 articles · Updated · The Wire · Aug 13
Summary
Seven contenders remain in the UN secretary-general race, with a July 30 Security Council straw poll showing no easy consensus before a nominee is expected to go to the General Assembly in early October.
The contest turns less on credentials than on veto politics, with any candidate needing to satisfy all five permanent Security Council members and, in practice, bridge the positions of the US, Russia and China.
Latin America and the Caribbean are widely seen as next in line under regional rotation, putting figures including Rebeca Grynspan, Michelle Bachelet, Maria Fernanda Espinosa and Rafael Grossi in sharper focus.
Geneva ties run through much of the field, but the report says that background may also be a liability as scrutiny grows over UN bureaucracy, agency sprawl and whether candidates used current posts or resources to aid their campaigns.
Roughly 40 intergovernmental organisations and more than 180 permanent missions are based in Geneva, making the city central to UN diplomacy and to a broader debate over whether the next chief should streamline the system.