Germany Faces Difficult Year at U.N.

For German diplomats at Germany's Permanent Mission to the United Nations, the daily trip to work at the U.N. headquarters in New York couldn't be closer: The two buildings are only separated by one busy street.

How close relations between Berlin and New York will be and how Germany's new role as a temporary member on the Security Council team will affect these relations in the near future, however, in particular over the contentious issue of a military attack on Iraq, remains to be seen.

Excellent German-U.N. relations

Germany is now serving on the U.N. Security Council team as a temporary member for the fourth time since it joined the United Nations in 1973. Since then, Germany has built up a relationship with the U.N. which is viewed as seemless, if not downright excellent. Both U.N. General Secretary Kofi Annan and German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer are known to get on well, on both professional and private terms.

Most importantly, Germany has become the third-largest contributor to the UN, following the U.S. and Japan, transferring around €340 million ($346 million) a year to fund U.N. peacekeeping missions, international conferences, and the international tribunal courts.

In addition, Germany has taken on a far more active role than in the early '70s, when it was invited to join the United Nations, more than two decades after the end of WWII. According to Tono Eitel, U.N. ambassador at the time, and meanwhile retired, "(at that time) we still stood under the beady eye of the four allied powers".

It was only after unification, that Germany was regarded as a full, albeit temporary member. In the past years, Eitel recalls, Germany, regardless of the party on the country's government, has adopted a common direction in its U.N. policies. "We have only wanted to attract attention to our constructive cooperation. I think that we have tried very hard in this direction and that we have achieved a certain success," Eitel says.

Balkans breakthrough

It was due to the German participation in the UN peacekeeping mission in Bosnia that Germany saw its breakthrough on the United Nations stage, and was from then on regarded and treated as a reliable member.

Today, German troops are deployed in U.N. missions all over the world. In the Balkans and in Afghanistan, Germany has taken a leading role in the reconstruction of these countries under a U.N. mandate. In addition, civilian Germans work in the organisations' numerous offices worldwide, in the U.N. headquarters in New York, and the International Court of Justice in The Hague.

Although the German government appears to concentrate more on affairs concerning European Union, as opposed to the United Nations, Fischer has repeatedly stressed the importance of the UN as a worldwide operating institution combating terror, poverty and the effects of war.

"(The United Nations) is the only organization able to provide the frame in which injustice between rich and poor and a balance between different peoples, between all peoples and regions, global peace and a sustainable development can be achieved," he said.

For Fischer, the organisation's power to act, and the strengthening of this power, is a question of fate for humanity in the 21st century.

Still not a permanent member

However, for former U.N. diplomats like Eitel, it is still unclear why Germany, despite its "constructive cooperation," and repeated show of support for the U.N., has still has not pushed for a permanent seat on the Security Council.

Instead, the German chancellor has adopted a more contained stance on this issue. According to Gerhard Schröder, "We are not standing on the mat and jostling ( to get in). Instead we are dealing very calmly with it, without doubting our political beliefs."

The Iraq question

Indeed, there are more contentious issues on the agenda in the coming months -- the most prominent of which will be a military attack on Iraq, for which the US are stationing more and more troops in the Golf region.

As tension heightens over a possible war, the German government is finding itself in an increasing squeeze due to its new role on the Security Council and its pledge made in the pre-election campaign to not participate in a war on Iraq.

On Tuesday, speaking to the nation in his New Year's speech, Schröder indicated it was still open how Germany would vote on the matter in the Council, sparking fears that the Chancellor may soften his anti-war stance among coalition ranks.

Schröder's speech followed remarks made by Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer in an interview in the newsweekly Spiegel last weekend. "Nobody can predict the German vote at the Security Council," Fischer said, "because nobody knows how and under which circumstances the Security Council will deal with it."

On Sunday, the Social Democratic Party's spokesman for Foreign Affairs, Hans-Ulrich Klose, said he couldn't imagine Germany "pulling back" against a collective decision to act against Iraq on the Security Council.

"I can't imagine that happening -- it would be a setback for Germany's position in the world," he told the Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung newspaper.