Yes, the UN is terrible – but right now, we need it desperately

September 27, 2026 — 4:30pm

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Quiz question: What country surpasses Haiti, Somalia and Congo as a deadbeat and rogue nation?

Answer: In the halls of the United Nations, it’s the good old USA.

The Trump administration is delinquent on UN dues, while 141 countries – including those mentioned above – are fully paid up. And while other countries at least pretend to advance peace in the spirit of the UN, President Donald Trump used his UN speech to threaten to “annihilate” Iran and “drive them into hell”. It was a rare instance of a world leader taking to the UN podium to muse about whether to commit what sounds like genocide.

All of this underscores a tragedy of our era: some 130 armed conflicts are under way around the globe, more than double the number in 2009, according to the International Committee of the Red Cross, and a growing share of the challenges afflicting us are international and require multilateral solutions, yet the major powers are marginalising the UN and rendering it even less effective than usual.

Fuel prices are surging. Trump’s Iran war has spread to Yemen and the Red Sea. Russia is engaging in so-called grey-zone attacks in Europe. There is a risk of war with China over Taiwan or the South China Sea. Drugs, epidemics, artificial intelligence, computer hacking, terrorism, human trafficking, climate change, looming famine in Somalia, the toll of war in Ukraine, Sudan and the Gaza Strip – all of these challenges demand co-operative responses, and the UN is an obvious forum to........

© The Sydney Morning Herald