UNITED NATIONS (AP) – Britain’s new ambassador to the UN says the government is feeling “excited” to continue its role as a major player on the world stage, despite its departure from the European Union.
Barbara Woodward pointed to the UK’s permanent seat on the powerful UN Security Council, its presidency this year of the Group of Seven major industrialized nations, its participation in the Group of the 20 major economic powers and NATO, and its welcome to the next United Nations global climate summit in Glasgow, Scotland in November.
“Don’t underestimate the power of the relationship with the EU,” she emphasized in an interview with The Associated Press last week. “There are many values and principles that we share with European partners and that I think will help us to maintain ourselves.”
Britain’s long and sometimes contentious divorce from the EU ended on December 31, a division that left the 27-member bloc without one of its main economic powers and the UK more free to shape its future, but facing a world that tries to face a deadly pandemic and deal with growing unemployment, growing divisions between rich and poor and a climate crisis.
An article in the American magazine World Politics Review in October identified three visions for Britain’s future: “Catastrophists who argue that the UK has become completely irrelevant on the international stage as a result of Brexit; the nostalgic, who see a powerful Britain through the lens of a great colonial power; and deniers, who refuse to accept that Britain must adapt to a changing global context. ”
Authors Ben Judah, a Franco-British journalist and writer, and Georgina Wright, a Brexit researcher at the Institute for Government, a UK think tank, said that since Britain voted to leave the EU in 2016 “it is undeniable that both British leadership and influence over global affairs has been achieved. “
“In international circles, it has become fashionable to openly despise Britain’s weight in world affairs,” they said. “Even so, the country continues to have weight.”
Woodward, who came to the UN after more than five years as an ambassador to China and previously served in Russia, agrees.
“We’ve had three very introspective years with the Brexit negotiations and the management of COVID,” she said, but with the upcoming climate summit and Britain’s G-7 presidency as the group struggles with the economic recovery from the pandemic, “I think we have a big role to play. “
She said Prime Minister Boris Johnson is “very interested in multilateralism”. On December 31, when Britain was leaving the EU, he said the UK is now “free to make trade deals around the world and to boost our ambition to be a scientific superpower”.
Earlier this month, The Economist magazine said the UK had the opportunity to “cut a race on the world stage” with its G-7 presidency – including possible invitations to Australia, India and South Korea to participate in the group sessions – and hosting the climate summit in Glasgow, “the most important diplomatic event of the year”.
Johnson is expected to visit India and be Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s guest of honor on Republic Day on January 26, “part of a much-lauded ‘Indo-Pacific bias’,” said the Economist, adding that Britain has also opened discussions to join the 11-nation Trans-Pacific Partnership and is pushing to become a “dialogue partner” of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations.
Woodward said the UK’s withdrawal from the EU makes the permanent seat of the UN Security Council and Britain “more important because the UN has always been the largest multilateral forum”.
She pointed to Sunday’s hybrid celebration of the first United Nations General Assembly meeting in London, 75 years ago, that Britain is hosting, saying the world is very different today, “but many of the divisions may be even more so. deep now ”.
In the coming year, said Woodward, there are three main issues that need to be resolved:
– Vaccinate rich and poor people everywhere against the coronavirus and act to revive the economies devastated by the pandemic.
—Make climate change a priority, with a focus on preventing temperature rise and raising the billions needed to make progress;
—Dealing with a number of global security issues.
Woodward said Iran will be a central security issue, regardless of whether U.S. President-elect Joseph Biden moves forward with his inclination to rejoin the 2015 nuclear deal from which President Donald Trump withdrew. She cited Iran’s role in other conflicts, including in Yemen and Syria.
There are also security issues in other parts of the Middle East and Africa, where terrorist attacks in the Sahel are of particular concern, as well as security issues related to the protection of digital data.
“I think that the relations that the new (US) administration decides to have with all its allies – European partners, NATO allies, as it builds a relationship with China, will be critical, as well as the way we work together at the UN Council of Security, ”said Woodward.