UN Business Falls Victim to Feuding Between the U.S. and China

As hostility rises between the world’s two biggest economies, the business of the United Nations is increasingly falling prey to their competition. The U.S. and China have been feuding over everything from the novel coronavirus to 5G networks to Hong Kong, and tensions are spilling into UN meetings, adding a layer of difficulty in a place where getting things done is already hard enough. The two countries wield veto powers as permanent members of the UN Security Council, along with the U.K., France, and Russia.

“Even one or two years ago, U.S. diplomats described the Chinese as reasonably pragmatic in the Security Council, despite big differences over issues like Syria,” says Richard Gowan, UN director at the Crisis Group, a Brussels think tank. “Relations between Chinese and U.S. diplomats have cooled shockingly fast.”