UNSCS2 Mission Report
Group United States
Mission Report
United Nations Council Meeting on Situation in Burma hold on 25th May 2021 in New York was to discuss humanitarian problem such as human right issue and Royingha refugee and political issue in Myanmar. Firstly, all countries are very concerned about the humanitarian crisis and refugee problems. As a start, Countries pass on their words of appreciation before bringing up their concerns. China seek dialogue between all involving parties in the internal affairs in Burma and avoid the use of force. Estonia stresses the concern for humanitarian issues that was spawned in Burma and demand immediate help from the international community. Whereas, Vietnam express concern and calls for immediate stop of violence against women and children. However, different countries have different ideas on what measures should be carried out to solve this on going crisis.
There are three major contentious issue during the negotiation of the draft resolution. First, China interpreted the first clause of the draft as too demanding of the military. The sponsor team counter arguments of it being necessary led the debate to be resolved through a moderated caucus. Moreover, Kenya disagree to this clause and demand to replace “fulfill everything for citizens” to “respect the voice of the citizens”. However, after informal negotiation, all countries were able to come up a compromising clause. Secondly, the sponsor side proposed to put smart sanctions on Burma while the other raised the issue of overstepping sovereignty. China mentioned that ASEAN and United Nations should cooperates to provide good office and humanitarian access to Burma instead. The majority of the committee opposed to the change. The last debate regarding clause number 5 was over sub-clause “c”. Russia argued that the solution of arms embargo and sanctions will not only be ineffective to deal with the military elites, but also, as a side effect, will badly impact the people as well. These debates and controversial ideas led to a deadlock in decisions.
As a representative of the United States of America, we have proposed a number of solutions which align with the sponsor group including provision of humanitarian aids, the application of sanctions and arms embargo. In addition, the United States stuck to defending democratic values and to provide practical solutions that would allow for long term development. However, the proposed resolution regarding the sanctions and arm embargo was not adopted because they were blocked by China and Russia.
The heated disputes between the P5 and UN members led to many undecided clauses in the draft resolution that ultimately cause the final vote of adopting the draft resolution to fail. From the occurrence in the United Nations Security Council meeting on the situation in Burma, we, representing the delegates of the United States of America learned several things that can be improved upon. First, concrete evidence and examples are important to get the point across as well as to try and convince your fellow member states. Moreover, in making amendments to one clause, delegates should discuss privately in order to incorporate their different amendments into one clause to propose during the meeting. This mistake was made as in the case of Russia and China proposing to amend clause 5 in two instances. Finally, the chair played an important role in keeping the meeting and the negotiation run smoothly as well as ensuring all actions are in accordance to the rules of procedures during the debates and the meeting.
UNSCS2%20Mis%2006677 Mission_Report_(Guideline_and_Sample).pdf.pdf)