Battleground USA 2020: Will US Cede Leadership Space In Multilateral Organisations? Will Biden Rejoin International Agreements?

In an exclusive interview with senior journalist Smita Sharma, Asoke Mukerji – Former Indian Envoy To UN, Yoshita Singh, Senior Journalist, PTI, New York and Dr Rajeshwari P Rajagopalan- Distinguished Fellow & Nuclear Expert talk about the various aspects of the US presidential elections to be held in November.

New Delhi: "Days after taking office, we shocked the Washington Establishment and withdrew from the last Administration's job-killing Trans-Pacific Partnership. I then approved the Keystone XL and Dakota Access Pipelines, ended the unfair and costly Paris Climate Accord, and secured, for the first time, American Energy Independence,” said Donald Trump at the final night of the Republican National Convention as he officially accepted his re-nomination as the Presidential candidate. “I withdrew from the terrible, one-sided Iran Nuclear Deal,” Trump further cited as an example of his America First Policy in his 71-minute long speech.

So what is at stake for the world and international organisations in the race for White House? In this episode of Battleground USA 2020, senior journalist Smita Sharma asked if the United States would become more inward-looking and shy away from its leadership role in global organisations if Trump were to return to power.

“What is at stake is the leadership role that the United States has played since January 1942. A long long journey from the Washington conference that set in process the move to create the United Nations. The leadership role that the US acquired over these decades has somehow been dented if not diluted in the past 5 to 6 years. The outcome of this election will have a major impact on that central issue,” said Asoke Mukerji, India’s former Permanent Representative to the United Nations in New York.

“Withdrawing from institutions has a downside which has to be understood. In 2006 the UN General Assembly created the Human Rights Council. John Bolton was the US Ambassador and he voted against the creation of this council along with three other countries that voted against it. But the council was created by a majority of 170 countries. Now the United States sat out three years. Did not seek elections to the UNHRC. And in those three years, the Human Rights Council set its procedures including the procedure to deal with Israel. So if you fast forward it to Ambassador Nikki Haley’s time they criticised the procedure. But if you are not inside the room when the procedures are drafted then you cannot do anything about it from the outside,” explained the retired diplomat further.

United States under Donald Trump has pulled out of several international agreements like the Paris Climate Act to the Iran Nuclear Deal and has cut the funding of several United Nations agencies and multilateral pacts pertaining to trade and environment or weakened other global bodies like World Trade Organisation (WTO) through its controversial decisions. So if Joe Biden were to win the November race would his administration be able and willing to reverse these decisions and strengthen global multilateralism? Would the Iran nuclear agreement be back on the table for the Biden administration at a time when strategic cooperation has increased between Iran, China and Russia?

“The Obama administration went ahead with a deal which was quite heavily skewed in favour of Iran. It may not be the most popular view but the fact is Iran managed to bargain such a great deal for themselves. The kind of clauses that are there in terms of withdrawals, inspections, each of those clauses if you look at-Iran is known for its bargaining tactic,” says Dr Rajeshwari P Rajagopalan, a former technical advisor with the United Nations. Dr.Rajagopalan who is a Distinguished Fellow and Head of the Nuclear and Space Initiative at Observer Research Foundation (ORF) believes irrespective of the international sanctions or the hurdles Iran is going to pursue a nuclear program which will make it tougher for a Biden administration to do a rethinking about the agreement especially with the China shadow on Tehran.

“It is going to put team Biden in a very tight spot because Biden team has also come out proving he has an even harsher tone on China.

How do you deal with China problem and challenge. China problem has become magnified in the last few years. China has taken over or getting into a leadership role in many of the UN organisations. So US has ceded away a lot of strategic space to China. Biden now will be in a fix in how you manage both the Iran-China combination of powers, or even Iran-China-Russia all coming together in a sense and they just had a naval exercise towards the end of last year,” she said.

Asked if the withdrawal from the Paris Climate Act is an election issue, Yoshita Singh a senior journalist in New York with the Press Trust of India (PTI) said,“ The wildfires, the Hurricanes, the floods across Asia is all the impact of Climate Change and it is now for all of us to see. All of us are bearing the brunt of it in real life. And When the Trump administration, the US which has been historically been one of the biggest polluters, pulls out of a Paris agreement that was not decided upon in a week’s or a month but took a lot of years lot of efforts, lot of give and take with many stakeholders involved in the agreement, then it has a lot of repercussions for all of us human beings especially the vulnerable societies, the small islands, the developing nations.”

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“People won’t think of Climate change as a big issue when they vote. At this point of time is it about the economy, the jobs, about healthcare specially in the pandemic that the US might be the most powerful country in the world, the most financially strong country in the world, but the pandemic really brought it to its knees, the health infrastructure came crumbling down. So those will be the issues,” she further added.

Meanwhile, Trump’s Presidential opponent Joe Biden has made it clear that the United States would rejoin the World Health Organisation if they win the November polls. The Democratic Party at the national convention earlier pledged to ensure that the United States remains WHO’s leading funder and technical partner, reversing a year-long process Trump initiated with the support pullout scheduled to come into effect in early December this year.

“The US pulling out of WHO has huge implications like ceding away space to China and others. But it also shows the need for urgent review and reform of some of the multilateral organisations that needs to happen so that these organisations are not beholden to one single power. They are not hijacked by one single power and the leadership of these multilateral organisations do not remain taken over by one country. India also has the leadership potential and the responsibility at this time to partner with some of the likeminded countries in coming together, work with their allies and partners, to promote neutrality, transparency, accountability, so that these institutions work professionally,” said Dr.Rajagopalan on the issue.

Asoke Mukerji argued further that the solution has to come from within the WHO itself towards reforms and reclaiming credibility given serious allegations of the organisation’s biases towards Beijing when the Corona Virus outbreak happened. He also added that amid the debate on multilateralism and American leadership, as India looks to take up its seat on the United Nations Security Council as an elected member in 2021, it must prepare to play a vocal role towards important causes.

“Politically inside the UNSC chamber, India will have to show more activism specially on issues in and around our neighbourhood in Asia. Issues like Yemen, Syria, issues where we have economic investments like South Sudan, we cannot let these be handled by permanent members all the time,” said Asoke Mukerji.

Asked if team Biden-Harris would be able to walk the talk on reclaiming US leadership on multilateral organisations and what would be the challenges if Trump returns to power, Yoshita Singh replied, “There are chances that the Democrats will hold the Senate and the House. So maybe they will have the numbers and Biden and White House will be able to bring back America into a lot of these folds and agreements. He will take the call.”

“But in the next two years, there are about 15 elections in key UN bodies, key heads of UN organisations, agencies. So President Trump has been very critical of the UN as well. Not just its agencies but the UN as a whole. So if Trump returns and you do not out American candidatures for these seats then we will see countries like China and others who want to increase their influence in the UN they will put forward their candidates who will sit at the heads of these organisations and take the calls and make decisions. So US has to see that it cannot move out of multilateralism,” she further remarked.