About 130 heads of state and government are meeting this week in New York at the General Debate of the 81st session of the United Nations (UN) General Assembly, after a year marked by escalating conflicts in the Middle East and Ukraine, as well as concerns over the control of artificial intelligence.
Among the participants is Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić, who is traveling to New York today.
As reported by the British agency Reuters, for the second year in a row, U.S. President Donald Trump will address the UN General Assembly, unlike his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping, who will skip it and instead have a meeting with Trump at the White House on Thursday.
Such a choice by the Chinese president will certainly spark debate about the relevance of the United Nations amid global crises and Trump’s attacks on multilateral institutions established after World War II.
The American president has withdrawn the U.S. from numerous UN agencies and drastically reduced Washington’s financial contribution.
“We would no longer say that the UN is in free fall, but rather that it is stuck in a crisis with no foreseeable end,” assessed Richard Gowan of the International Crisis Group.
He said that the UN may “no longer be in intensive care as it was last year, but it seems doomed to remain in the emergency room forever.”
To avoid losing its vote in the General Assembly, Washington last week paid $725 million into the regular budget, but still owes the organization more than one billion dollars, while continuing to demand reforms in return.
Such a moral and financial crisis is compounded by questions about the successor to Secretary-General António Guterres, whose term ends at the end of the year. A clear candidate for his successor has yet to emerge.
Former Portuguese Socialist Prime Minister stated that artificial intelligence will be the main topic at the General Assembly in the coming days, as several business leaders in the sector have recently warned about the dangers posed by this technology.
According to Guterres, countries should establish “joint safeguards to avoid a race that could one day lead to a massive global catastrophe.”
The Secretary-General has long advocated for the establishment of global governance for artificial intelligence. In 2023, the UN established an advisory body for this technology, composed of industry leaders, government representatives, and academics.
Trump dismissed Guterres’s concerns, considering the risks associated with artificial intelligence a “fraud,” claiming that China will benefit from doubts sown about its development.
The Middle East will be another important topic of discussion, as the war launched by the U.S. and Israel against Iran at the end of February continues to fuel global inflation and destabilize the region.
Negotiations between Iran and the U.S. are at a standstill, as the two countries continue to exchange airstrikes, and Trump regularly threatens major escalation.
Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian is expected to address the General Assembly on Wednesday.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who has been indicted by the International Criminal Court for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity in the Gaza Strip—charges Israel denies—will speak on Thursday.
For the second year in a row, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas will not be present in New York, as the U.S. denied him a visa, and he will participate via video link.
A high-level meeting on the war in Sudan is expected to be held on the sidelines of the event, according to diplomats, although a diplomatic breakthrough is unlikely.
The war in Ukraine will also fuel debates, and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov are expected to address the General Assembly.
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