There has been a great deal of scuttlebutt in the last twenty four hours speculating about a proposition I blogged about on SM almost two years ago. UN Official and author Shashi Tharoor has been nominated by India for the position of Secretary General of the United Nations once Kofi Annan’s term ends:
India has decided to nominate a career UN diplomat, Shashi Tharoor, for the post of UN secretary-general.
The Ministry of External Affairs in Delhi says that Indian missions abroad have begun seeking support from member nations to back Mr Tharoor’s candidacy.
Mr Tharoor is currently the under secretary-general for communications and public information in the UN.
He has worked in the world body for nearly three decades since completing his PhD at Tufts University in the US… Mr Tharoor, an Indian national, has written several novels, including a political satire, The Great Indian Novel. [Link]
UN watchers have long speculated that the next Secretary General will come from Asia, since it seems to be Asia’s turn to have a go at the job of herding cats.
There are three other Asian candidates are in the running - Ambassador Jayantha Dhanapala of Sri Lanka, Thailand’s Deputy Prime Minister Surakiart Sathirathai and the South Korean Foreign Minister Ban Ki-moon.
However observers in India say Mr Tharoor’s long association with the UN works to his advantage. [Link]
The real question however is what President Bush and the U.S. Ambassador to the UN, John Bolton think of Tharoor. I am SURE at least that they think he is better than one of the alternatives. Without U.S. backing it is hard to imagine Tharoor rise to the top. If some in the Israeli lobby have anything to say about it, Tharoor’s rise won’t be easy. Look at the invective already making its way onto the internet, such as over on Israpundit:
For quite some time I’ve been chronicling the exploits of the UN’s propaganda minister, the loathsome Shashi Tharoor. You name it, he’s done it: overseen a fat, grotesquely wasteful propaganda apparatus, and run Israel-bashing media events featuring anti-Semites and professional hate-Israel polemicists.
Tharoor has had a hankering to succeed Kofi Annan as secretary general, and the media today reports that it’s official. India, apparently putting national loyalty over common sense, has just officially nominated Tharoor for the job. [Link]
The New York Sun has some of the best behind the scenes analysis of Tharoor’s chances:
But when it came to the big job - that of secretary-general - India always bowed to the tradition that candidates were suggested not because of their personal qualifications but because of their provenance. Geographical rotation was paramount. The big nations, including the five permanent members of the Security Council, tacitly agreed not to field candidates. Secretaries-general were picked from small, nondescript nations. The conventional wisdom was that such men - and they were always men - would be more amenable to guidance from the big powers.
The decision to put Mr. Tharoor’s name forward cracked that tradition, up to a point, and the question is why. It is not that Mr. Tharoor was owed favors by Mr. Singh’s Congress Party-led ruling coalition of 14 fissiparous political parties and groupings. On the contrary, Mr. Tharoor’s politics are nonpartisan. His copious and elegant writings as a novelist, biographer, and columnist haven’t suggested anything other than a faith in secularism…A second explanation might be found in the political and economic relationship between the Singh government and the Bush administration. President Bush has already gone against the political grain in Washington by agreeing to sell nuclear technology to India even without Mr. Singh signing the nonproliferation treaty. The placement of a Washington-backed prominent Indian figure as U.N. steward could represent the logical next step in the blossoming Bush-Singh nexus.
That is but conjecture. It’s by no means assured that Mr. Singh will find Washington receptive to Mr. Tharoor. Yesterday, I encountered a former American envoy in Turtle Bay, Richard Holbrooke. He declined to comment on the race for secretary-general, but he has privately told friends that he didn’t think Mr. Tharoor’s prospects were especially bright. Ambassador Bolton, the current envoy, is not known to be enthusiastic about Mr. Tharoor. That may have more to do with Mr. Bolton’s reported preference for a candidate from outside the U.N. system. Mr. Tharoor is given little chance around the press room. [Link]
Now as your probably guessed, if India is going to nominate someone then Pakistan can’t be too far behind. First they throw up a press balloon:
Pakistan on Friday termed as ‘speculation’ reports that it plans to field Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz or some high profile candidate against India’s nominee Shashi Tharoor for the UN Secretary-General post.“It is all speculation at the moment,” Pakistan Foreign Office Spokesperson Tasnim Aslam said when asked about reports that Islamabad plans to field Aziz, who had previously served as Vice President of City Bank, for the UN top post. [Link]
Having met Tharoor before I think he’d probably be a good choice but I’d be surprised if he actually made it. He seems to be very intelligent, nuanced in thought, and is a good observer. Usually we don’t get to see so much depth in our world leaders. :)
See Related posts: The next U.N. Sec Gen?? , Tharoor, not Kidman, is the Interpreter, Exercising American power at the book market, The Guardians of the British Raj
