Last modified: Wednesday, March 30, 2005
Proposed changes to United Nations will be focus of town hall meeting
BLOOMINGTON, Ind. -- United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan last week unveiled a sweeping plan to reform the United Nations. It included recommendations to expand the U.N. Security Council, restructure the Human Rights Commission to prevent countries with poor human rights records from becoming members, and outlaw terrorism as a tool for national resistance.
Members of the Indiana University Bloomington community will have an opportunity to learn more about and scrutinize these proposals during a town hall meeting, "Possibilities for United Nations Reform," on Tuesday (April 5) from 2 p.m. to 3:30 p.m. at Whittenberger Auditorium in the Indiana Memorial Union. The event is part of a national series of town hall meetings on U.N. reform sponsored by Americans for Informed Democracy and the Stanley Foundation.
Bruce Rashkow, director of the U.N. General Legal Division, will provide comments along with John Clark, a senior fellow in international security and development at the Sagamore Institute for Policy Research, and David Fidler, professsor of law and Ira C. Batman Faculty Fellow at the IU School of Law-Bloomington. The panelists then will participate in an open discussion with students and members of the community.
"The United Nations is generally seen as a bureaucratic institution not responsive to public concerns. We're trying to put the recommendations for reform before the general public in the United States and allow the public to discuss and debate them," said Seth Green, executive director of Americans for Informed Democracy, a non-partisan organization that seeks to foster global understanding.
The town hall meeting is being supported by the IU Hutton Honors College and the IU Conversations About Service and Engagement program.
