Baqaei's Central Criticism
Baqaei invoked former UN Secretary General Dag Hammarskjöld, who he said had warned against reducing the United Nations to static conference machinery serving great-power diplomacy rather than a dynamic instrument for protecting the security of smaller nations. He noted that Hammarskjöld staked his entire tenure on that conviction.
By contrast, Baqaei said, the current Secretary General appears to be shrinking the organization's purpose to avoiding a war between superpowers. He argued this minimalist reading twists Article 2(4) of the UN Charter into a doctrine that renders the overwhelming majority of the membership irrelevant, excuses almost every war, and hollows out the Charter's founding principles and purposes.
