Global Dispatches -- World News That Matters

My guest today Srgjan Kerim is a diplomat with the soul of an artist, who wants to become the next UN Secretary General. Karim is the former foreign minister of Macedonia, was an official in the Federal government of the former Yugoslavia and also served as president of the UN General Assembly back in 2007-8. He's a self described citizen of the world. He was born in Macedonia, but spent much of his formative years in Germany and has lived at various times all over the world. We discuss his unique upbringing, some of his academic work in development economics, and his experience during the dissolution of the former Yugoslavia. And, not least, he discusses how to create gorgeous photographs using a blackberry device.

Vesna Pusic is the former foreign minister of Croatia and a candidate to become the next UN Secretary General. She's a sociologist by training. Politician and diplomat by practice and I caught up with her one day after she participated in hours of questioning by UN member states in what was essentially a very public job interview for the position of Secretary General Pusic grew up in Zagreb in a household of intellectuals in the aftermath of World War Two, which was particularly brutal in Croatia where Nazi collaborators carried out acts of genocide and persecution. She became ensconced in academia and later turned to politics. In her twenties, she started the first feminist NGO in Yugoslavia, and she discusses that experience. This conversation is part of our UN Secretary General candidate conversations. Stay tuned for more in depth conversations with the individuals who wish to be the next leader of the United Nations

Something extraordinary took place at the United Nations this week. For twenty hours, over three days, each candidate in the race to become the next UN secretary general submitted themselves to hours of questioning by member states and civil society. This was a radical departure from how things were done previously. For the past 70 years, the Secretary General was picked pretty much behind closed doors by the five veto wielding members of the Security Council. It was a totally un-transparent process, sometimes you did not even know who was in the running. This time around, that is not quite how things are going down. For one, there are actually declared candidates--9 so far. And each of these candidates faced two hours of questioning by member states, forcing them to go on the record on some hot button global issues. And it was all webcast! I watched nearly all of it. I would be lying to you if I said that it was all riveting political theater. But for UN nerds like me and my guest Richard Gowen the novelty of it all offered some insights into the inner-workings of the United Nations, what individual countries prioritize in deciding who to back for Secretary General, and a glimpse into the diplomatic acumen of the candidates' in the hot seat. So, because these hearings were new, and different and genuinely exciting for UN watchers like Richard and I, this episode is in two parts. We first spoke before the hearings even began about our expectations for this event and discussed what we would be looking out for. Then, on Thursday afternoon, just as the hearings were wrapping up, we spoke again about some of the highlights from the week and any tea leaves that could be read into both the questions that the member states asked and the answers given. For anyone who wants to learn what these public job interviews for the position of UN Secretary General can tell you about the UN and international relations more broadly, have a listen.

Danilo Turk is the former president of Slovenia and one of eight currently declared candidates to be the next United Nations Secretary General. He was president from 2007 to 2012 and also served as his country's ambassador to the UN for many years. Turk was born in 1952, just seven years following the Nazi occupation of Slovenia. He shares how his mother's experience of being sent to a forced labor camp at the age of 14 affected his own childhood. That included an intense focus on eduction. By the time he was 14, Turk was devouring the greek classics, like Thucydides. By 18 he was in law school, discovering concepts of human rights. We have an extended conversation about the intellectual curiosity that lead Turk to human rights law and what it was like being a human rights legal scholar in the former Yugoslavia, which was then a communist country. We discuss his role during Slovenia's 1991 secession from the former Yugoslavia and the brief war that ensued, and the tactics he used as Slovenia's first ambassador to the UN to introduce this new country to the world. I caught up with Dr. Turk at his hotel room in Dakar, Senegal, where he was chairing a conference about the intersection of water and peace. We kick off with a brief discussion about that issue. In the next several months, the world will select the next Secretary General of the United Nations. There are so far eight candidates to succeed Ban Ki Moon, and this conversation is part of a special podcast series in which the candidates discuss the big moments in their lives and careers that helped to shape their own worldview. The idea here is to introduce the candidates' personal and professional histories into the public discourse and hopefully illuminate how past experiences may guide their decision making as Sec Gen.

Ban Ki moon visited a refugee camp in Algeria that is home to people displaced by conflict in Western Sahara and he uttered remarks that created a diplomatic maelstrom. Ban referred to the quote "occupation" of Western Sahara, by the government of Morocco. Morocco responded with a massive government sponsored protest in the streets of Rabat, and also ceased cooperation with a UN peacekeeping mission in Western Sahara, including evicting civilian members of that mission. It has also threatened to pull its own troops from UN peacekeeping missions worldwide. All because of a word. With me to put this current diplomatic crisis into the larger context of the decades old dispute over the proper status of western sahara is Fiyola Hoosen-Steele. She is not a disinterested observer of this crisis. As the UN representative of the diplomatic advisory firm Independent Diplomat, she works with political representatives of the Western Saharan indepdeence movement, known as the Frente Polisario. She explains the roots of the conflict in Western Sahara and the current diplomatic obstacles to its resolution.

Mary Fitzgerald is an Irish journalist who for the better part of five years has covered Libya, including the fall of Gaddafi, Libya's fractured politics, and the the rise of ISIS. Mary got her start in journalism covering the conflict in Northern Ireland and she discusses how she applies what she learned studying that conflict to help her better understand Libya. We kick off with an extended discussion about the current political situation in Libya, which is complicated, but fascinating, and Mary does an excellent job of breaking it all down. I've made this point before, but I do think that Libya is going to be one of the most important foreign policy crises facing the United States and Europe next year, particularly as the next president takes office. And this conversation offers a great way to understand the drivers of conflict in Libya.

Work started at the United Nations this week on the next big global enviromental treaty. The treaty would create rules of the road for management of the high seas. This would include provisions to create marine sanctuaries and other mechanisms to preserve sea life and biodiversity. On the line to discuss this new treaty (which does not yet have a name) is Elizabeth Wilson of the Pew Charitable Trusts. She explains the problems that this new treaty aspires to solve, how it would fit into already existing treaties, like the Convention on the Law of the Sea, and the process and politics surrounding the crafting of this treaty and its eventual ratification.

The last time I saw Anna Day we were both attending a conference in Dubai. That was just last month, in February. I hopped a plane back to the United States. She went to Bahrain, and was promptly arrested with her crew. They were filming a documentary about the legacy of the Arab Spring uprisings when they were detained by Bahrani authorities and charged with crimes that carried hefty sentences. Anna recounts that experience in pretty vivid detail. But getting arrested in Bahrain is just the latest challenge that Anna has faced while trying to tell stories from the middle east. She was one of the first western journalists to detail the rise of ISIS in Syria, and before that she was one of the first American journalists in Tahrir square as the Egypt Arab Spring began. If you are interested in learning more about the situation in Bahrain, I actually served as the publisher of an e- book by the journalist Elizabeth Dickinson about Bahrain, called Who Shot Ahmed, A Mystery Unravels in Bahrain's Arab Spring, that tells the story of the murder of a young activist and his family's quest for justice.

The attacks in Brussels this week are accelerating an already heated conversation in Europe about the unrelenting movement of refugee from the Middle East to the continent. The attacks on Tuesday came just days after the EU sealed a highly controversial agreement with Turkey in which refugees arriving to the greek islands would be expelled back to Turkey. This agreement is highly maligned by the United Nations and refugee advocates for reasons I discuss with a UN official and a refugee advocate. This episode is in two parts. First, I speak with Melissa Flemming, a spokesperson for the UN Refugee Agency, also known as UNHCR. She offers a grounds eye view of how this new deal is affecting the work of the UN Refugee Agency on the Greek Islands and explains why UNHCR is refusing to collaborate in the implementation of this agreement. Next, I speak with Michel Gabaudan, president of Refugees International, who discusses the details of the deal and does a good job of putting it in a larger context of global refugee policy.

My guest today Somini Sengupta is the United Nations correspondent for the New York Times. She's the author of the new book The End of Karma: Hope and Fury Among India's Young which tells the story of a huge demographic challenge facing India today, where 365 million people are between the ages of 10 and 24. It is the youngest country on the planet, and through storytelling and reporting, Somini puts the experiences of India's young into the broader context of the country's political, social and economic challenges. Somini was born in Calcutta, but came to the Canada and then the USA at a young age. She joined the New York Times in the mid 1990s and she tells some powerful stories from her reporting in Africa in the early 2000s, including Liberia, Congo and Darfur. We kick off discussing her new book, and a term she coined to describe India's youth generation, the "noonday children."