The United Nations has so far failed to perform its basic role amid violent aggression

What role can the United Nations (UN) play in the Russia-Ukraine conflict?

The term ‘United Nations’ is a mis-nomer.

To what extent and in what areas of interest are the constituent nations committed and united?

What are the common interests and aspirations of all people of whatever and all nations?

Only when these are identified and agreed can we have any semblance of ‘United Nations’.

Smaller nations are more likely to have a common consensus.

The most basic common interest and aspiration is surely peace and stability to be a nation.

The primary role of a UN concept must therefore be to facilitate and protect peace and stability between and within the nations comprising the Union.

There can be no opting out or veto of that role by any nation.

Disputes arising between constituent nations, or within composite nations such as the UK, should be mediated by the Union to prevent violent conflict.

Unjustified violent aggression against a constituent nation, whether by another constituent or by an external nation or entity, should be countered by the whole UN, with no opting out or veto.

Russia has been engaged in violent aggression against Ukraine since the invasion of the Crimean peninsula in 2014 and covert infiltration in the east of Ukraine.

The UN has, so far, failed to perform its basic primary role in this conflict, as it failed in the case of China’s take-over of Tibet several decades ago, and in more recent conflicts elsewhere.

Will the UN again prove to be spineless if China invades Taiwan in the near future?

To establish its credentials, and justify its continuing existence, the UN must now act decisively in the Russia-Ukraine conflict.

Dennis Golden, Strabane