A Russian as UN counter-terrorism czar? Bad idea

"The placement of a Putin operative, Russian senior diplomat Vladimir Voronkov, to run the United Nations Counter-Terrorism offices is being touted as the first major reform of the United Nations Organization by its new Secretary-General Antonio Guterres.

The only reform is that Russia changed its mind against insisting on its Washington Ambassador Sergey Kislyak for this new command, probably due to his controversial meddling in DC, including the Michael Flynn matter. Nonetheless, Putin's choice looks to be one of the UN's most damaging setbacks in years.

Recently the General Assembly finalized the creation of a new, expensive Under-Secretary-General for Counter-Terrorism post tailored for a Russian incumbent. It was the UN spoils system at work. Voronkov had laid in wait in Vienna as head of UN offices there for several years where he helped puppeteer the 'Iran Deal' Obama bought. After the Soviet meltdown and Russia's twenty-five years of slow, geopolitical rehabilitation, Moscow's new senior insider can now approach the gates of Oz, UN Headquarters in New York. He will settle in like a low-grade headache and eventually show Secretary-General Guterres that the UN isn't big enough for the both...

How did things come to this?

The Obama Administration colluded with Russia to select Guterres for Secretary-General in late 2016. It was part of a trade-off intended to keep Obama's operative, Jeffrey Feltman, at the top of the UN Secretariat's powerful Department of Political Affairs no matter the US election. Likewise, France, Britain and China wanted to keep their senior-most operatives positioned in a Guterres administration.

Keeping Russia's hands off "their" senior posts required creating a new senior post for Russia which had outgrown it patience exiled in secondary UN posts. So, the General Assembly decided to greenlight a customized senior post for Secretary-General Guterres to fill as he wished, in exchange for a Russian promise not to veto Guterres' bid for Secretary-General...

Meantime, be assured that Vladimir Putin's version of counter-terrorism strategy-from the man abetting Bashar al-Assad's atrocities in Syria, will get a thorough and respectful airing at the United Nations Organization."