The United Nations is facing one of the worst crises in its eight-decade history: Its biggest financial contributor, the United States, is withholding billions of dollars from vital U.N. agencies and programs. The U.N. leadership and wealthy democracies need to act quickly to ensure the world body can salvage lifesaving programs the U.S. is defunding.
The U.N. was in difficult financial straits even before President Donald Trump’s second inauguration. The institution has been struggling with a liquidity crisis for years, largely caused by late and unpredictable payments from the U.S. and China, the U.N.’s biggest contributors.
The U.S., which played a leadership role in establishing the U.N., is required to pay 22% of the global body’s $3.7 regular budget this year, because it has the biggest economy. The member state with the second-largest economy, China, is required to pay 20%. Other top contributors include Japan at 7%, Germany at nearly 6%, and the UK and France at roughly 4% each.
When Trump returned to the White House in January, the U.S. already owed nearly $3 billion in back payments to the general U.N. budget, peacekeeping and tribunals alone. That doesn’t include billions of dollars in voluntary U.S. contributions to individual U.N. agencies and programs. The administration announced it would withdraw from the U.N.’s World Health Organization and halt funding to the Human Rights Council and UNRWA, the Palestinian refugee support agency, mirroring the president’s actions in his first term.
But this time, the White House also has terminated the vast majority of its foreign aid commitments through the U.S. Agency for International Development in a cruel and reckless manner at the expense of human lives. By abandoning its financial obligations to the U.N., Washington is forcing the U.N. to also undertake devastating cuts as it struggles to address humanitarian crises in Sudan, Ukraine, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Haiti, the Palestinian territories, Myanmar and elsewhere that are stretching the organization to the breaking point.
Once unthinkable scenarios like defunding the U.N. entirely or a full U.S. withdrawal from the U.N. have suddenly become thinkable.
This Monday, U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres presented his “UN80” reform strategy to make the U.N. more nimble and cost-effective, while warning that the U.N. is facing “real threats” that require extensive cost-cutting and streamlining. I obtained a six-page confidential memo that outlined his plans, which include consolidating mandates, cutting senior posts and reducing the U.N.’s presence in expensive locations like its New York City headquarters.
It is unclear if the U.N. can make up for the near-total loss of U.S. funding. The U.N. will be laying off large numbers of staff, which could devastate its ability to carry out lifesaving humanitarian and human rights work. The U.N.’s World Food Program will cut up to 30% of its staff. The U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs plans to lay off 20%.
The office of the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees is also planning to lay off as much as a third staff – despite a projected 20% increase in refugee resettlement needs this year.
While some U.N.80 proposals might have merit, the human rights section is worrying. It suggests downgrading and cutting several senior human rights posts and merging activities. It also proposes merging independent protection mandates like those focused on children in armed conflict and sexual violence – an unworkable proposal that risks rendering them ineffective and irrelevant.
Russia and China have long lobbied to defund the U.N.’s human rights work. There is a risk that the U.S., which has gutted its own funding for human rights worldwide, will no longer oppose these efforts and will instead enable them.
Investigations into human rights abuses and war crimes in places like Ukraine, Sudan, and Israel and the Palestinian territories – crucial for deterring abuses and holding perpetrators accountable – are hampered by staffing shortages and a lack of funds.
In response to what’s happening in Washington, European Union foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas recently declared that “the free world needs a new leader. It’s up to us, Europeans, to take this challenge.”
Indeed, as the world’s wealthiest economic and political bloc, and a vocal supporter of multilateralism and the rules-based international order, the EU should prioritize finding additional funds to help the U.N. keep saving lives. The EU and its democratic allies should demonstrate leadership on human rights and run with it – even if the U.S. obstructs or tries to punish them.
