Human nature itself must be
attuned to walking out before a speech by political leaders who intentionally
have enemy civilians killed and severely injured, and to being attracted to hear
leaders who represent the victims. So, at the UN in September, 2026, many
delegates at the UN’s General Assembly walked out before a speech by Israel’s
Netanyahu, who was wanted by the International Criminal Court for crimes
against humanity in Gaza (and arguably even in the West Bank), and Russia’s
Putin did not even attend the opening session of speeches, whereas the address
by Ukraine’s President Zelensky was to a full room. The contrast between
Zelensky and the other two men could not be starker, and yet the UN was open to
all three, serial violations of the UN Charter notwithstanding. The international
organization can be said to have its legs wide open, and paradoxically to be
impotent even with regard to enforcing its own charter. As a visiting research
scholar at Harvard in 2025, I had the opportunity to speak personally with
former UN officials, all of whom admitted that, given the vetoes in the
Security Council, the UN itself could not even be reformed so the organization could
even pass meaningful resolutions against a powerful member’s ally; something
stronger at the global level would be needed if international law stood a
chance of being enforced rather than merely given lip service. In 2026, even
the notion of international law risked being relegated as an oxymoron, assuming
that law itself—to be considered law rather than guideline or policy—requires
a viable enforcement mechanism. To say that something is a law but is not
enforced is to say that something really isn’t a law.
Flaunting the UN appearance of
Ukraine’s president, Russia’s president unleased bombs in Kyiv and other cities
in Ukraine as if to dare the UN to take action on Ukraine’s behalf. Not by
accident, “Russia hammered Ukraine’s capital Kyiv with drones in daylight
attacks . . . hours before Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy was due to
address world leaders at the UN General Assembly. Two people were killed and 23
were wounded in Kyiv, and palls of black smoke floated above the city following
the latest in what have been daily Russian attacks that torment Ukrainian civilians.”[1]
Whereas Ukraine was targeting Russian oil facilities, Russia was going after
civilians. The difference constitutes legitimate war from war crimes. For
Russia to committing such crimes just hours before a highlighted address by
Ukraine’s president at the UN is as if to dare the UN, and the world, to take military
action to stop Russia from attacking Ukraine. That Russia had invaded Ukraine
without the latter having provoked Russia militarily is itself a war crime, and
in violation of the UN Charter. Indeed, at the time, Russia’s President Putin
had an arrest warrant issued by the International Criminal Court, but as no
means of automatic enforcement had any credibility, the ability of the ICC to
issue warrants deservedly warrants ridicule. Hence Russia’s Putin felt free to
dare the UN to take notice and even action.
In spite of representing a people serially victimized by a military aggressor, Zelenskyy could only hope to speak of half-measures at the UN. In his address, he said, “When someone gives Russia more money through trade, they give this war more time. And that is exactly why we insist on limiting trade with the aggressor, and why we are burning Russia’s revenues ourselves.”[2] This strategy differs significantly from that of killing and wounding Russia civilians so the Russian people might pressure Putin to remove his military forces from Ukraine; but going after trade is indirect at best at getting Russia out of Ukraine militarily. Even though insisted, the governments represented at the UN could trade with Russia nonetheless, and with complete impunity from the UN, as Russia held a veto in the Security Council and could thus exploit a conflict of interest by thwarting any resolution contrary to Russia’s geopolitical and economic interests. At the core of the UN’s impotence and thus lack of credibility can be said to be a structural conflict of interest, wherein even violators of the UN Charter (and their allies) could block any unfavorable resolutions.
So, Russia’s President Putin could taunt Ukraine and, in effect, make fun of the world, by serially bombing Ukraine just hours before Zelensky’s address at the UN without worrying in the slightest that the UN or a coalition, or bloc, of sovereign countries might ascend on Ukraine to rid it of Russian military equipment and troops, or even send anti-missile weapons to Ukraine. Thus it could be said that by 2026, the post-World-War-II world order had virtually collapsed even though its institutions were still standing and even moving, like the limbs of some insects that still kick just after death and thus such insects appear to still be alive.