IHRC is among a host of prominent organisations, academics and activists that have today written to the United Nations demanding that the organisation fulfil its mandate in the face of threats to its legitimacy presented by the “rapacious” actions of the US.

Highlighting the damage to international peace that US exceptionalism has caused since the Second World War, the 145 signatories accuse the UN of a humiliating “impotence” over the US-backed Israeli genocide in Gaza that has reduced its credibility to unprecedented levels.

The letter accuses the international body of standing idly by while the US rides roughshod over the UN’s prescription on the ‘threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state”.

UN inaction has only encouraged US arrogance and unilateralism, to the point that today the US no longer worries about maintaining the pretence of adhering to international law, behaving like a maniacal power-hungry, violent entity that oppresses its own citizens and inhabitants, and simultaneously wreaking havoc across the world in pursuit of power and resources.

The letter reminds the UN that it retains many tools in its armoury to deal with the out of control US state. These include measures such as statements and sanctions that can isolate it on the international stage and investigations by the ICJ to hold it to account for transgressions. “If the will exists there can be more ways that the UN can bring the weight of the moral authority resting in its charter to bear on the US and those who still support its crimes” say the signatories.

The world is running out of time. The recent attack on Venezuela and kidnapping of its president and his wife, the bombing of Nigeria, the deployment of US forces near Iran and the interference in Tehran’s internal affairs to depose its government, as well as threats to seize control of Greenland all speak to the urgency of reining in a recalcitrant power.

“The failure of the UN to act now will be its end”, warns the letter. “It will also herald a new epoch of grand lawlessness. We demand you act now, or forever be associated with the nightmare that will inevitably come through your inaction.”

The letter and the list of signatories can be viewed here.

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