The The Unitarian Church in NSW PO Box 355, Darlinghurst NSW 1300 15 Francis Street, East Sydney (near Museum Station) Tel: (02) 9360 2038 www.sydneyunitarianchurch.org SUN Sydney Unitarian News Editor: M.R. McPhee October/November 2018 VALE, KOFI ANNAN As another United Nations Day (24 October) comes around, it’s sad to have a commemorative topic so ready to hand – the unfortunate passing of Kofi Annan on 18 August 2018. He was the seventh Secretary-General of the UN, serving from 1997 to 2006, and the first to have a prior history of working for that organisation. He served two terms and continued to work for peace after he retired. He was also one of the only two Secretary- Generals to be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. Kofi Annan (the surname rhymes with ‘cannon’) and his twin sister, Efua, were born on 08 April 1938 to an aristocratic family in Kumasi, the second city in what was then the British colony of Gold Coast. In 1958, a year after Ghana became independent, he commenced an economics degree at Kumasi College of Science and Technology, which a Ford Foundation grant enabled him to complete at Macalester College in St. Paul, Minnesota, in 1961. He then undertook a post-graduate diploma in international relations at the Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies in Geneva. Annan worked as a budget officer in the World Health Organisation from 1962 to 1971 (presumably at its headquarters in Geneva), after which he obtained a master’s degree in management from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1972. After working as a manager in the state-owned Ghana Tourist Development Company, he returned to Geneva in 1980 as head of personnel in the UN High Commission for Refugees. In 1983, he became the director of administrative management services for the UN Secretariat in New York; by 1987, he was an Assistant Secretary-General for Human Resources Management; and, in 1990, he moved to Assistant Secretary-General for Program Planning, Budget and Finance, and Control. At the beginning of 1992, Boutros Boutros-Ghali of Egypt (pictured at left) became Secretary-General, the first African to hold that position. One of his first actions was to establish the Department of Peacekeeping Operations, headed by Under-Secretary-General Marrack Goulding of the UK with Annan as his Deputy. The new department soon found itself directing the UN Protective Force (UNPROFOR) when the Bosnian War broke out and, less than a year later, the second UN Operation in Somalia. Goulding moved to a new department in March 1993 and was succeeded by Annan, who became involved in the worst phase of the Bosnian War. While NATO had come in with aircraft and heavy land equipment that the UN forces lacked, it took another two years before Serbia and Croatia abandoned their efforts to partition Bosnia-Herzegovina at the expense of its sizeable Muslim population. 1 Order was not restored until the end of 1995, by which time Annan had been appointed as a Special Repre- sentative of the Secretary-General to the former Yugoslavia. The military operations in Bosnia had been out of Annan’s hands and the same was true of the ill-fated UN Assistance Mission in Rwanda in 1994, which largely failed to prevent the genocide that took place there. Boutros-Ghali ran unopposed for a second term as Secretary-General and every other member of the Security Council supported him. However, the US blamed him for the failure of the UN Operation in Somalia and it used its veto power against him. Annan was then chosen by the Council over Amara Essy of Tunisia and, after confirmation by the General Assembly, he took office on 01 January 1997. He would be re-elected unopposed to a second term, commencing at the beginning of 2002. During his tenure, Annan made many changes to the structure and operations of the UN, though not all of his recommendations were adopted. His two reports in 1997 called for streamlining the UN bureaucracy, the form- ation of a cabinet-style body to assist him and the grouping of the UN’s activities around four core missions. In 2000, mindful of failures such as in Rwanda and Somalia, he formed the Panel on UN Peace Operations under the chairmanship of Lakhdar Brahimi of Algeria, which reported that such missions must be adequately financed and resourced, and have clear, credible and achievable mandates. In the same year, Annan convened a Millennium Summit of 150 world leaders at the UN headquarters in New York. That three-day meeting endorsed the Millennium Development Goals which, among other things, were to eradicate extreme poverty, achieve universal primary education, combat HIV/AIDS and forge a global partnership for development. An important feature of this initiative was the Global Compact, a unique engage- ment with private corporations to commit to sustainable and socially responsible policies in the developing world, such as fair wages for employees, safe working conditions and the abolition of child labour. As early as 1998, Annan had been personally involved in Nigeria’s transition from military to civilian rule. In the following year, he supported East Timor’s efforts to regain its independence from Indonesia, sending a Transitional Administration to Dili after the Australian-led intervention. In 2000, he was responsible for certi- fying Israel’s withdrawal from southern Lebanon. In 2001, he shared the Nobel Peace Prize with the UN itself, which the second Secretary-General, Dag Hammarskjöld, had been awarded posthumously in 1961. In his second term, he strove unsuccessfully to prevent the US and UK from invading Iraq in 2003, declaring that such an action was illegal without the UN’s approval. In 2006, he led talks in New York between the presidents of Nigeria and Cameroon that resolved a long-standing border dispute. In that last year of his tenure, he started the process of sending a joint UN-African Union mission to stabilise Darfur in Sudan. (Continued on p. 12.) SERVICE DIARY Meetings every Sunday from 10.30 – 11.30 a.m. (followed by coffee, tea and food) Date Presenter Topic 7th October Bill Markham Antipodean Adventures* 14th October Peter Crawford Spirituality in the Face of Death 21st October Mike McPhee Continental Europe Revisited (Part 2)* 28th October Peter Crawford Leadership in the Mid-Twentieth Century 4th November Patrick Bernard Maxim Gorky: Russian Writer 11th November Peter Crawford Visit to ANZAC Memorial 18th November Kaine Hayward Folk Music for Male Vocal Trio** 25th November Paul Schuback Three Historical Architecture Styles* * These will be video presentations. ** This will be a Music Service. [Please check the church website (www.sydneyunitarianchurch.org) for updates. The program for December will be available from the beginning of November.] 2 Pimeydessä voi loistaa monia valoja. Jotkin Many lights may shine in the darkness. Some johtavat harhapoluille ja jättävät kulkijan yhä lead astray and leave the wanderer ever deeper synkempään pimeyteen sammuessaan. in the dark when they go out. May this light Johtakoon tämä valo, jonka sytytämme yhdessä, that we light together lead us to our right, own meidät oikeille, omille teillemme yhteydessä ways in connection with each other and every- toisiimme ja kaikkiin ympärillämme. Pysyköön one around us. May this flame stay and spread tämä liekki ja levitköön heijastuksena around us as a reflection of our compassion until myötätunnostamme, kunnes näemme saman we see the same light of tolerance and sensibility suvaitsevaisuuden ja rakkauden järjen valon within love mirrored in the world as in our maailmassa kuten sydämissämme. hearts. Submitted by the Unitarian Church in Finland; Finnish and (presumably) English words written by its leader, Päivi Helena Kesti. We light this chalice remembering the special gifts from the African continent. Its natural beauty, its deep humanity and its spontaneous joy. We light this chalice to remind ourselves that we are all children of Africa – the cradle of humankind. We light this chalice to share the light of Liberty in Africa, for the children of the world to see Africa beyond the colonial scars and admire her beauty in the people, the land and all inhabitants of Africa. We light this chalice in celebration of our efforts, trying to find ways and means for a suitable U/U vision that reflects African realities. We light this chalice for Africa and all her people. May they have health, peace and prosperity. May their future and the future of the world be as bright as this light. We light this chalice to think of our Unitarian brothers and sisters who are still finding their way. May this flame light their orientation and dedication. We light this chalice in remembrance of all that are suffering around the world that they may find comfort, hope, and renewal in their faith. We light the chalice for solidarity in our global human family that we may work together to protect those who are most vulnerable and most in need. We light this chalice for everlasting love justice compassion acceptance and everlasting interaction between us and nature. We light this chalice to affirm our original roots, our beliefs, our faiths, and from there to connect to the world community to make this earth a better place for us and generations to come. Submitted by the Unitarian/Universalist Pan African Cooperative Leadership Team: Françioise Niragira and Jean Bosco Ndihokabwayo (Burundi); Justine Magara and Emma Wanjiru (Kenya); Adeyinka Matimoju (Nigeria); Jean Maurice Ndagijimana and Clement Uwayisaba (Rwanda); Malan Roux and Gur Mouanga (South Africa). [These are the Chalice Lightings for the months of August and September.] The Unitarian Church in Finland is a relatively new group, formed in Helsinki and modelled on the Tran- sylvanian Church.