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Platform Statements — United Nations
Monday February 06, 2012
DNC 2008: United Nations
To enhance global cooperation on issues from weapons proliferation to climate change, we need stronger international institutions. We believe that the United Nations is indispensable but requires far-reaching reform. The U.N. Secretariat’s management practices remain inadequate. Peacekeeping operations are overextended. The new U.N. Human Rights Council remains biased and ineffective. Yet none of these problems will be solved unless America rededicates itself to the organization and its mission. We support reforming key global institutions—such as the U.N. Security Council and the G-8—so they will be more reflective of 21st Century realities.
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Monday February 06, 2012
RNC 2008: United Nations
At the United Nations, our country will pay a fair, but not disproportionate, share of dues, but we will never support a UN-imposed tax. The UN must reform its scandal-ridden and corrupt management and become more accountable and transparent in its operations and expenses. As a matter of U.S. sovereignty, American forces must remain under American command. Discrimination against Israel at the UN is unacceptable. We welcome Israel’s membership in the Western European and Others Group at the UN headquarters and demand its full acceptance and participation at all UN venues. We likewise oppose the ideological campaign against Vatican participation in UN conferences and other activities.
CATEGORIES: 2008 RNC United Nations
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Monday February 06, 2012
RNC 2004: United Nations
We applaud President Bush and the Republican Congress for working to end the unacceptable discrimination against Israel at the United Nations, by that institution’s denying committee assignments to Israel. We welcome Israel’s membership in the Western European and Others Group at the United Nations headquarters and urge its full acceptance at other United Nations venues. We support adoption of bipartisan legislation to withhold the annual headquarters contribution made by the U.S. Department of State to the International Committee of the Red Cross if Magen David Adom is not given the opportunity to participate fully in the activities of the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement.
CATEGORIES: 2004 RNC United Nations
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Monday February 06, 2012
RNC 2000: United Nations
The United States will pay a fair, not disproportionate, share of dues to the United Nations once it has reformed its management and taken steps to eliminate waste, fraud, and abuse. All funds that the U.S. contributes for operations, conferences, and peacekeeping should count against these dues. …The next Republican administration will use its diplomatic influence to put an end to a pattern of discrimination that persists at the United Nations in denying committee assignments to Israel. It will do the likewise at the International Red Cross which refuses to accredit the symbol of Magen David Adom, Israel’s equivalent of the Red Cross. …
CATEGORIES: 2000 RNC United Nations
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Monday February 06, 2012
RNC 1996: United Nations
The Clinton administration’s failure to couple American interests abroad with foreign aid has produced wasteful spending and has presented an impediment to achieving a balanced budget. A Republican administration will ensure foreign aid is cost-effective and based on its important role in directly promoting American national interests.
CATEGORIES: 1996 RNC United Nations
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Monday February 06, 2012
RNC 1984: United Nations
We recognize that attacks in the U.N. against Israel are but thinly disguised attacks against the United States, for it is our shared ideals and democratic way of life that are their true target. Thus, when a U.N. agency denied Israel’s right to participate, we withheld our financial support until that action was corrected. ... the anti-American bureaucracy of the U.N.‘s Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) will no longer be supported by U.S. taxpayers. We will not support international organizations inconsistent with our interests. In particular, we will work to eliminate their funding of Communist states.
[M]embers [of the UN] consistently vote against us. This is why President Reagan announced that we will leave the worst of these organizations, UNESCO. He has put the U.N. on notice that the U.S. will strongly oppose the use of the U.N. to foster anti-semitism… [W]e will apply the same standards to all international organizations. We will monitor their votes and activities, and particularly the votes of member states which receive U.S. aid.
CATEGORIES: 1984 RNC United Nations
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Monday February 06, 2012
DNC 1980: United Nations
In each of the regions of the globe, international organizations and agencies will be tested in the coming decade and will play an increasingly crucial role. The United Nations remains the only forum where rich and poor, East and West, and neutral nations can come together to air their grievances, participate in respected forums of world opinion, and find mechanisms to resolve disputes without resort to force. In particular, in recent months the UN has been a forum for expressing the world’s condemnation and rejection of both the hostage-taking in Iran and the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. The United Nations is also vital in other ways—through its international refugee efforts, coordination of development assistance, support for agricultural research, and worldwide eradication of disease.The United Nations and these agencies perform a vital role in the search for peace. They deserve America’s continuing support—and they will receive it from the Democratic Administration. We support the call in Section 503 of the Foreign Relations Authorization Act of 1978, for the United States to make “a major effort toward reforming and restructuring the United Nations system.” We also endorse that portion of the President’s report to Congress in March, 1978 on UN reform and restructuring which calls for the Senate “to reexamine the Connally reservation,” “the creation of a U.N. Peacekeeping Reserve composed of national contingents trained in peacekeeping functions,” the establishment of “a new UN senior post as High Commissioner of Human Rights,” and the development of autonomous sources of income for the international community.
CATEGORIES: 1980 DNC United Nations
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Monday February 06, 2012
DNC 1976: United Nations
We cannot give expression to our national values without continuing to play a strong role in the affairs of the United Nations and its agencies. Firm and positive advocacy of our positions is essential. We should make a major effort at reforming and restructuring the U.N. systems. The intensity of interrelated problems is rapidly increasing, and it is likely that in the future, the issues of war and peace will be more a function of economic and social problems than of the military security problems that have dominated international relations since 1945. The heat of debate at the General Assembly should not obscure the value of our supporting United Nations involvement in keeping the peace and in the increasingly complex technical and social problems—such as pollution, health, economic development and population growth—that challenge the world community. But we must let the world know that anti-American polemics are no substitute for sound policy and that the United Nations is weakened by harsh rhetoric from other countries or by blasphemous resolutions such as the one equating Zionism and racism.
CATEGORIES: 1976 DNC United Nations
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Monday February 06, 2012
RNC 1976: United Nations
The United States does not wish to dictate to the U.N., yet we do have every right to expect and insist that scrupulous care be given to the rights of all members. Steamroller techniques for advancing discriminatory actions will be opposed. Actions such as the malicious attempt to depict Zionism as a form of racism are inconsistent with the objectives of the United Nations and are repugnant to the United States. The United States will continue to be a firm supporter and defender of any nation subjected to such outrageous assaults. We will not accept ideological abuses of the United States.
CATEGORIES: 1976 RNC United Nations
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Monday February 06, 2012
DNC 1972: United Nations
The United Nations.—The U.N. cannot solve all the great political problems of our time, but in an increasingly interdependent world, a world body is essential and its potential must be increasingly relied upon. The next Democratic Administration should: Re-establish the U.N. as a key forum for international activity, and assign representatives with the highest qualification for diplomacy; Give strong executive branch leadership for U.S. acceptance of its obligations for U.N. financing, while renegotiating arrangement for sharing U.N. costs; Work for development of enforceable world law as a basis for peace, and endorse repeal of the Connally Reservation on U.S. acceptance of World Court jurisdiction.
CATEGORIES: 1972 DNC United Nations
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Looking at Iran by James Zogby
Kahlil Gibran Awards Gala - April 16, 2013
