{"id":13401,"date":"2018-08-07T09:32:47","date_gmt":"2018-08-07T13:32:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/english.cpnn-world.org\/?p=13401"},"modified":"2019-10-10T06:36:09","modified_gmt":"2019-10-10T10:36:09","slug":"european-parliament-calls-for-a-united-nations-parliamentary-assembly-and-a-un-reform-summit-in-2020","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/english.cpnn-world.org\/?p=13401","title":{"rendered":"European Parliament Calls for a United Nations Parliamentary Assembly and a UN Reform Summit in 2020"},"content":{"rendered":"
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DISARMAMENT & SECURITY .<\/p>\n

An article from the DWFed, Democratic World Federalists<\/a><\/p>\n

In a resolution adopted today [July 27], the European Parliament called on the EU\u2019s governments to advocate \u201cthe establishment of a United Nations Parliamentary Assembly\u201d (UNPA) and to support a \u201cUN 2020 summit\u201d that will consider \u201ccomprehensive reform measures for a renewal and strengthening of the United Nations.\u201d<\/p>\n

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TAccording to the European Parliament, a UNPA should be established \u201cwithin the UN system in order to increase the democratic character, the democratic accountability and the transparency of global governance and to allow for better citizen participation in the activities of the UN and, in particular, to contribute to the successful implementation of the UN Agenda 2030 and the Sustainable Development Goals.\u201d<\/p>\n

The directly elected parliament of the EU\u2019s citizens called on the EU\u2019s 28 member states represented in the Council of the EU to advocate the creation of a UNPA at the upcoming 73rd session of the United Nations General Assembly which will start in September.<\/p>\n

European parliamentarian Jo Leinen (S&D) who had initiated the call for a UNPA said that \u201cthe UN urgently requires more openness and stronger democratic foundations.\u201d He added that \u201cthe European Parliament therefore calls for the establishment of a Parliamentary Assembly within the United Nations system\u201d and that \u201cthe European Union and its member states should now play an active role in the implementation of this innovation.\u201d<\/p>\n

The European Parliament\u2019s rapporteur on this year\u2019s recommendations on the EU\u2019s UN policy,\u00a0Eugen Freund\u00a0(S&D), said that since he first encountered UN reform forty years ago \u201cunfortunately, not much has changed.\u201d He added that \u201cthe General assembly has more members now, but it is still a body of unelected diplomats. Therefore, the idea of eventually complementing them with elected parliamentarians is a very appealing one. They would certainly be closer to the populace and thus would have to regularly answer to their constituency. Whether that would also streamline the decision-making processes remains to be seen.\u201d<\/p>\n

Other supporters of the call for a UNPA in the parliament\u2019s committee on foreign affairs included Elmar Brok (EPP), Soraya Post (S&D), Juan Fernando L\u00f3pez Aguilar (S&D), Helmut Scholz (GUE\/NGL), and Andrey Kovatchev (EPP).<\/p>\n

(continued in right column)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Question for this article:<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
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Proposals for Reform of the United Nations: Are they sufficiently radical?<\/a><\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

(continued from left column)<\/p>\n

The European Parliament\u2019s resolution was welcomed by Ivone Soares, a parliamentarian from Mozambique and a member of the African Union\u2019s Pan-African Parliament. \u201cWith resolutions passed by the European Parliament, the Pan-African Parliament and the Latin-American Parliament, the time has come for progressive governments in these three major world regions to consider the creation of a United Nations Parliamentary Assembly,\u201d Soares said.<\/p>\n

Daniel Jositsch, a member of the Swiss Council of States commented that \u201cthe escalating crisis in international cooperation shows that new ways must be found to combat global problems. It is therefore very positive that the European Parliament is calling on the European states to speak out in favour of the creation of a UN Parliament. It is important that they will not simply pay lip service to this goal, but that concrete implementation measures are being taken.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cFrom the many initiatives in favor of a more peaceful, fair and democratic world the creation of a UN Parliamentary Assembly is the decisive one. The recent support given by the European Parliament to this proposal shows that the members of the most important supranational parliamentary body are ready to work for its creation,\u201d commented Fernando Iglesias, a member of the Chamber of Deputies of Argentina.<\/p>\n

Jo Leinen, Ivone Soares, Daniel Jositsch and Fernando Iglesias are co-chairs of the parliamentary advisory group of the international Campaign for a UNPA which has been endorsed by over 1,500 elected representatives worldwide. The campaign\u2019s secretary-general, Andreas Bummel, said that the European Parliament\u2019s call for a UNPA was \u201ca bold and important step at a time when multilateralism is under attack.\u201d \u201cGovernments interested in defending and strengthening the UN and democracy worldwide should urgently work for the democratisation of global institutions and a UN Parliamentary Assembly is a key to achieve this,\u201d he added. Recently, the Irish foreign minister Simon Coveney stated that Ireland was \u201copen minded\u201d relative to proposals for a UNPA.<\/p>\n

The European Parliament\u2019s resolution on the EU\u2019s UN policy also recommended, among other things, the establishment of \u201can open and inclusive intergovernmental preparatory process under the auspices of the UN General Assembly for a UN 2020 summit, on the occasion of the UN\u2019s 75th anniversary\u201d that would consider \u201ccomprehensive reform measures for a renewal and strengthening of the United Nations.\u201d<\/p>\n

Earlier this year Jo Leinen and Andreas Bummel published a book on the history, today\u2019s relevance and future implementation of the proposal of a world parliament and on improving democratic world governance.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

DISARMAMENT & SECURITY . An article from the DWFed, Democratic World Federalists In a resolution adopted today [July 27], the European Parliament called on the EU\u2019s governments to advocate \u201cthe establishment of a United Nations Parliamentary Assembly\u201d (UNPA) and to support a \u201cUN 2020 summit\u201d that will consider \u201ccomprehensive reform measures for a renewal and … Continue reading European Parliament Calls for a United Nations Parliamentary Assembly and a UN Reform Summit in 2020<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[19,16,76,93],"tags":[11,94],"class_list":["post-13401","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-democracy","category-disarmament","category-global","category-united-nations","tag-global","tag-united-nations"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/english.cpnn-world.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13401","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/english.cpnn-world.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/english.cpnn-world.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/english.cpnn-world.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/english.cpnn-world.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=13401"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/english.cpnn-world.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13401\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/english.cpnn-world.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=13401"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/english.cpnn-world.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=13401"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/english.cpnn-world.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=13401"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}