From Our Bureau
NEW DELHI: Prime Minister Narendra Modi is skipping the 77th session of the United Nations General Assembly, the largest annual gathering of the world leaders, that began on September 19 in New York City. Instead, he has sent External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar to attend on behalf of India.
The meeting will be the first in-person General Assembly in three years, after the pandemic restricted movements. But the mood is likely to be a somber one. Leaders will address the war in Ukraine, mounting food and energy crises and concerns over climate disruptions, such as the floods in Pakistan.
Tensions are expected to be high between Russia, the U.S. and European countries over Ukraine — and between China and the U.S. over Taiwan and trade. Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping, the leaders of Russia and China, are not expected to attend.
The U.S. and Europe will most likely try to pressure Iran over the nuclear deal. And developing nations and the West will very likely spar over development aid.
“The General Assembly is meeting at a time of great peril,” António Guterres, the U.N. secretary-general, said last week.
Analysis: “This is the first General Assembly of a fundamentally divided world,” said Richard Gowan, the U.N. director at International Crisis Group, a research group based in Brussels. “We have spent six months with everyone battering each other. The gloves are off.”
South Korea: Yoon Suk Yeol, the new president of South Korea, is expected to address the General Assembly on Tuesday. Last week, he told the NYT Seoul bureau chief that it had become necessary — even inevitable — for South Korea to expand its security cooperation with Washington and Tokyo as North Korea intensified its nuclear threat.
