UN Administration Research Articles

LEGAL FRAMEWORK OF THE IDENTITY POLICY OF THE INTERNATIONAL COMMUNITY IN POSTWAR KOSOVO — A HISTORICAL OVERVIEW

Background: This paper aims to elaborate and analyse the legal context of the identity policy of the international community in post-war Kosovo. Through this policy, the nature of Kosovo was determined as an entity under the UN administration until 2008 and as an independent state after that. Given that NATO’s military intervention in Kosovo was initiated for humanitarian reasons and, therefore, was not an intervention aimed at resolving the historical conflict between Serbs and Albanians, the UN administration in Kosovo was also established by being neutral towards national interpretations on the “issue of Kosovo”. This paper will bring together arguments that the international community, in its approach to the people of Kosovo, has actively tried to establish a new political entity detached from any national projections, thereby preventing it from being perceived as a national victory, especially among the Albanian majority. For this reason, all laws, regulations, governing documents and policies of the UN mission, which delineated Kosovo’s political nature and way of governing, were based on the ‘principle of multi-ethnicity’. This paper also examines the negotiation process for determining Kosovo’s final status, through which independence was conditioned by the commitment to building a state based on the principle of multiethnicity. Methods: In this article, qualitative methods have been used since the focus of this paper has been the understanding of some of the concepts of the legal framework used in the process of state building of Kosovo after the war and the role that the international community played in the policies of identity. The authors try to connect the theoretical with the practical aspects to present a broader view of the topic of this article. This scientific article is a single case study research focusing on the state of Kosovo in the post-war period. Data analyses were collected from the official documents of international institutions and the state of Kosovo. The historical method content analysis of the legal documents used in this paper has helped to achieve a deeper understanding of the topic presented in this paper. Results and Conclusions: The authors’ findings indicate that in post-war Kosovo, the international community in post-war Kosovo has established a neutral political entity in terms of national identification. This has been achieved through a legal and constitutional framework that prioritises identity by promoting multi-ethnicity and civic identity as the political identity of the people of Kosovo. This discrepancy between state and national identity has given rise to an identity crisis, especially among the Albanian majority population. This has resulted in religious radicalisation in part of the population and a lack of loyalty to the state in other parts of the country.

Everyday Practices of Gender in the Serbian Community of Post-War South-East Kosovo

This article aims to explore the everyday practices of gender in the Serbian community of south-east Kosovo, in a post-war context marked by sudden and radical political and social changes that deeply altered everyday life after 1999 and the establishment of the UN administration. As family and kinship ties are strongly expressed in the researched community, gender practices have been considered within that framework. This article is based on extensive multi-sited fieldwork conducted with members of the Serbian community in south-east Kosovo, and with displaced people from this region in several towns in Serbia. The field research focuses on everyday interactions and perspectives ‘from below’. The sudden and complex social and political changes that occurred after 1999 resulted in the transformation of the family structure and family roles, and thus to changes in gender practices. With the establishment of the international administration, influences linked to globalisation intensified. The migration of part of the community to Serbia, and the life of many of its members as ‘both here and there’, played an important role. Influences from Serbia, community guidance from the Serbian Orthodox Church, and changes in the ethnic and social landscape because of the war all combined to create opposing processes within the family. In family and gender relations, intensive, oppositional processes unfolded. These generated tensions within the community: the nuclearisation of the family and, for certain aspects, the liberalisation of relations in it and, at the same time, repatriarchalisation.

Implementation of the Implied Powers Doctrine by the UN International Court of Justice

The article provides for an overview and analysis of the UN ICJ’s practice on implementation of the implied powers doctrine. Main Court’s cases (judgments and advisory opinions) related to this doctrine were examined (Reparation for Injuries Suffered in the Service of the UN (1949), Effect of Awards of Compensation made by the UN Administrative Tribunal (1954), Certain Expenses of the UN (1962), Legality of the Use by a State of Nuclear Weapons in Armed Conflict (1996), and Fisheries Jurisdiction (1998)).
 It is noted that the implied powers doctrine became an implementation of the principle of efficiency, which is well known in international judicial practice as the principle interpretatio fiеnda est ut res magis valeat quam pereat. It allows to interpret the charters of international organizations in a more ‘dynamic manner’. The implied powers doctrine, on the one hand, expands the limits of such interpretation, and on the other hand, it limits it. Its antipode is the doctrine of inherent powers that allows to make more broadly interpretation of the charters of international organization based only on its goals. In this connection a comparative analysis of two competing doctrines – of implied powers and inherent powers – is made.
 The author of the article examined the legal positions of the International Court of Justice that allow to the supporters of the inherent powers doctrine to assert that it has wide application. But, based on the methods of interpretation used by the ICJ in making these judgments and advisory opinions, he come to the conclusion that the Court fully supports exactly the implied powers doctrine.

The Applicability of the Law of Occupation to UN Administration of Foreign Territory

This contribution seeks to critically examine the UN position with respect to the legal status of the administration of territory by UN-authorised actors. The essay first explores whether the law of occupation applies to direct administration of foreign territory by the UN or its authorized organs. It then examines as a case study the practice of the UN administration of Kosovo. The essay argues that unfettered discretion for civil servants, even international civil servants, undermines the functionality of any administration. Embracing the discipline of accountability embedded in the law of occupation to UN-led administration of territories is therefore required. This discussion provides the grounding for the argument that as a matter of both lex lata and lex ferenda any administration of territories without a valid sovereign consent, even when exercised by the UN, qualifies as an occupation, and is hence subject to the requirements of law of occupation.

Toxicity of high uranium doses in broilers and protection with mineral adsorbents.

The aim of this study was to determine the uranium distribution and histopathological changes in broiler organs (kidney, liver, and brain) and muscle after 7 days of contamination with high doses of uranyl nitrate hexahydrate (UN), and the protective efficiency of three different mineral adsorbents (organobentonite, organozeolite, and sepiolite). During the 7 days, the UN administration was 50mg per day, and administration of adsorbents was 2g per day immediately after UN. In control group where broilers received only UN, histopathological changes such as necrosis of intestinal villi, oedema, vacuolisation and abruption of epithelial cells in renal tubules, oedema and vacuolisation of the cytoplasm of hepatocytes, and dystrophic changes in the neurons of the medulla oblongata were observed. In contrast, when the adsorbents organobentonite, organozeolite, and sepiolite were administered, no histopathological changes were observed in liver and brain. The investigated adsorbents showed the highest protective effects in liver (80-92%), compared to the kidney (77-86%), brain (37-64%), and meat (31-63%).

Domestic Workplace: Critical Crossroads of Unorganized Labour and Management

In the world of work at large, domestic workplace constitutes an altogether different space for hitherto labour jurisprudence and more so in the given age of liberalization-privatization-globalization worldwide. The way workforce used to get together at workplace and thereby unionized to form trade union in factory, mine, plantation and other establishments cannot take place anyway in case of domestic workplace. No wonder that the same attracts attention of relevant stakeholders on several counts, for example, labour on the one side and management on the other side. The author explores peculiarity of such workplace, issues involved therein along with means and methods to address major hurdles for management and labour studies to grapple with one among the least explored workplaces of the world. The forthcoming paragraphs are meant to grapple with relative (read comparative) vulnerability for members of the workforce inside a space otherwise meant for private individual use, albeit with the potential for abuse to gross detriment of the workforce and, at times, of the management as well. With recent focus of the International Labour Organization (ILO), the labour wing of the UN administration and one among the oldest institutions meant for global governance since the League of Nations regime, a unique trajectory of labour jurisprudence is on its wise to save stakeholders of the workplace from drudgery, if not vagary, of injustice with impunity. The hitherto private space is thereby increasingly converted to public space during its working hours in technical sense of the term and thereby subjected to the rule of law genre available elsewhere outside.

Tata Kelola Sistem Manajemen Informasi Obyek Pajak Menggunakan Kerangka Kerja Cobit 5.0

SISMIOP is the heart of the United Nations because all aspects of administrative management that can manage data objects and tax subjects that have been computerized start from the process of data collection, assessment, penyangihan, acceptance and service. The existence of SISMIOP is intended to create an accurate and up to date database by intercepting all UN administration activities into a container, so that the implementation is more uniform, simple, fast and efficient. To know how far the management of the Tax Object Management Information System (SISMIOP) that has been used by the Financial and Asset Management Revenue Service, it is necessary to measure by using good method and framework. The tools or tools used to evaluate the governance of SISMIOP are using Control Objective For Information and Related Technology 5 (COBIT 5.0). The COBIT 5.0 maturity model does not intend to measure a level very accurately or certify when a level is achieved, but rather to a relevant picture or condition of some level of maturity to be achieved, this model is appropriate when management wants to see conformity to the conditions of information technology development And proper maturity.

Liberating Kosovo: coercive diplomacy and U.S. intervention

Kosovo, after its incorporation into the Serbian Republic of Yugoslavia, became increasingly restive during the 1990s as Yugoslavia plunged into internal war and Kosovo's ethnic Albanian residents (Kosovars) sought autonomy. In March 1999, NATO forces began airstrikes against targets in Kosovo and Serbia in an effort to protect Kosovars against persecution. The bombing campaign ended in June 1999, and Kosovo was placed under transitional UN administration while negotiations on its status ensued. Kosovo eventually declared independence in 2008. Despite internal political tension and economic problems, the new nation has been recognized by many other countries and most of its inhabitants welcome its separation from Serbia. In Liberating Kosovo, David Phillips offers a compelling account of the negotiations and military actions that culminated in Kosovo's independence. Drawing on his own participation in the diplomatic process and interviews with leading participants, Phillips chronicles Slobodan Milosevic's rise to power, the sufferings of the Kosovars, and the events that led to the disintegration of Yugoslavia. He analyzes how NATO, the United Nations, and the United States employed diplomacy, aerial bombing, and peacekeeping forces to set in motion the process that led to independence for Kosovo. He also offers important insights into a critical issue in contemporary international politics: how and when the United States, other nations, and NGOs should act to prevent ethnic cleansing and severe human-rights abuses.

Ten years after: Challenges of human remains identification on the territory of Kosovo and Metohia

After the armed conflicts throughout the nineties of the twentieth century occurred in former Yugoslavia, identification of war victims is a challenging task. This paper gives a detailed description of exhumed remains identification process. One of the study objectives has been a comparison between DNA results and traditional forensic identification methods. This paper deals with the identification of human remains that were exhumed in Kosovo and Metohia in the period 20012011, belonging to Serbs and other non-Albanian ethnic communities (Montenegrins, Bosniaks, Roma, Gorani, and others), as well as much lower number of Albanians who were also killed during the war and post-war period. The exhumation and identification of human remains began even during the armed conflict, continued with a high intensity immediately after the establishment of UN administration in the province, and from the end of 2001 among the identified victims dominated those of non-Albanian origin – Serbs, Montenegrins, Roma, and others. The experience of this process and the experience of other countries show that there is a need to organize appropriate services for identification of human remains in Serbia, capable to react effectively in case of mass disaster.

International Statebuilding and Contentious Universities in Kosovo

This article discusses the politics of international administration and ownership in Kosovo, examining the case of the rebuilding of the higher education system in the period 1999–2007. It looks at the practice of international administration, analysing both the efforts of international actors to rebuild the Kosovar university system and the responses of local actors resisting and deeply influencing this process. A fine-grained reconstruction of the role of the UN administration in the process of building a new inter-ethnic university system in Kosovo reveals that local and international actors negotiated and dealt with each other, creating in the process an institutional structure that reflects the fundamental tensions and lack of consensus between the different stakeholders. The paper also argues that a mechanical view of the concept of ownership is not helpful, and that even in cases of international administration local actors are ‘co-owners’, who have a great influence on international plans and projects. It concludes that although the UN played an intrusive role in the process, the mission did not manage to achieve its goals.

The Use and Abuse of International Law: Choice of Applicable Criminal Law in Post-Conflict East Timor

In the context of post-conflict restructuring of the legal system, the use of international law is often perceived as a stabilizing factor, contributing to the protection of fundamental rights and protecting the separation of powers by imposing a more stringent standard for protection of human rights than domestic law does. However, international law operates at various levels and contexts, in some of which it may have a destabilizing effect on the domestic system. Moreover, the courts entrusted with applying international law, no less than other institutions may abuse their power, and such abuse carries particular weight as it is carried out under the guise of law.This article concerns an incident in which the Court of Appeal of East Timor invoked international legal principles relating to the consequences of illegal annexation when determining the domestic law of East Timor under UN administration and after independence, without due regard to their implications in the field of human rights. Rather than enhance the post-conflict reconstruction, this invocation risked destabilizing the emerging political and legal apparatus. While this attempt to bring about this change was thwarted by the objection of the legal community and the legislature, the incident demonstrates that the recourse to international law must be discriminatory so that it does not subvert the very purpose for which this law is invoked. The article describes the dilemma concerning the choice of applicable law in post-conflict East Timor, and the intended and unintended roles that international law has had in shaping that choice, noting the implications for domestic law of unqualified reliance on certain branches of international law. It also places the East Timorese experience in a wider context of post-conflict determinations of applicable law in light of international legal principles.

Reasonable Measures in Unreasonable Circumstances: A Legal Accountability Framework for Human Rights Violations in Post-Conflict Territories Under UN Administration

The administration of post-conflict territories by the United Nations has given rise to a peculiar challenge to the international legal regimes that ordinarily provide protection from and redress for human rights violations. As norms generated within a legal system in which states were the primary, almost exclusive, subjects of the law, the application of human rights, humanitarian, and international criminal law is complicated by the virtual absence of traditional state actors in such situations. Indeed, in these situations public power is exercised by an intergovernmental organization, and a disproportionate level of power is wielded by other non-state actors, including, in some instances, organized, armed groups.Essentially, this paper seeks to answer the question: how do we apply human rights and humanitarian law when all of the relevant parties are non-state actors? It attempts to answer this question by setting forth the relevant legal accountability framework, citing examples from the practice of the United Nations Interim Administration Mission in Kosovo (UNMIK), as well as the United Nations Transitional Administration in East Timor (UNTAET), and demonstrating the application of this framework in particularly challenging circumstances. Conclusions are then drawn from this exercise regarding the proper understanding of the framework in such situations.The first section examines the applicability of human rights law in the context of peace operations. The second section brings the application of humanitarian law into the analysis, supplemented with the inclusion of international criminal law in section three. These three areas of law are merged in the penultimate section into an accountability framework that covers the spectrum from state responsibility to the individual responsibility of non-state actors. This framework is applied in the final section to the tragic events that occurred in Mitrovica, Kosovo in February 2000. The analysis concludes by proposing an understanding of the framework that would enable it to better respond to the realities faced by victims in such situations and therefore to better comport with the purposes of these areas of international law.

The Security Council and Territorial Sovereignty: The Case of Kosovo

AbstractMore than ten years since NATO intervened militarily to stop the violence and to create the conditions for a new regime of international administration, Kosovo remains at the top on the agenda of international actors and institutions. The present contribution examines the nature and scope of the Security Council’s action (and inaction) with regard to the political crisis and ensuing conflict emerged in Kosovo starting from the late 1990s and how that practice has shaped notions of territorial sovereignty. It analyses the different forms of international intervention in the four phases of the Kosovo controversy (from the 1998‐1999 crisis to the current situation post declaration of independence, passing through the UN administration of the territory and the negotiations on future status), the extent to which international law played a role in dictating outcomes and results and the ways in which the notion of territorial sovereignty was reinterpreted by the Council. The main conclusion reached is that, while some of the measures adopted throughout the years have introduced important novelties in the contemporary conception of territorial sovereignty, that has been the result of harsh bargaining between different states and groups of states in which the Council has only provided for the diplomatic setting, rather than the end products of the Council’s own policy and strategies. Moreover, as the current discussions over the mandate and legal basis of EULEX show, the interpretation of those measures and instruments has been remarkably at variance among the different actors, surfacing diplomatic conflicts and ‘agreements to disagree’ that have been frozen, in some cases for years, under neutral UN procedures and operational strategies.

Western Soldiers and the Protection of Local Civilians in UN Peacekeeping Operations: Is a Nationalist Orientation in the Armed Forces Hindering Our Preparedness to Fight?

Mandates for UN peacekeeping operations in Africa have become more robust since the delivery of the Brahimi Report in 2000. Contrary to before, soldiers are now unmistakably expected to use force to protect local civilians in a number of UN peacekeeping missions in Africa. While this expectation of force may be celebrated, the question rises whether peacekeeping soldiers can meet the expectation. Are they ready to kill and risk their lives to protect local civilians? This question is especially pertinent to Western armed forces, which have contributed little to post-millennium UN peace operations in Africa but are explicitly called upon by the UN administration to contribute to the robust peacekeeping missions. This article discusses the question of moral and psychological preparedness in light of the possible tension between the nationalist orientation in Western armed forces and the cosmopolitan demands of UN peacekeeping operations in Africa.

Reform of the Administration of Justice System at the United Nations

AbstractFor nearly six decades, the administration of justice system at the United Nations has been comprised primarily of the Joint Appeals Boards, the Joint Disciplinary Committees and the UN Administrative Tribunal. In July 2009, these bodies will be dismantled and replaced with an entirely new system. This article will first describe the basic features of the administration of justice system at the United Nations that existed prior to July 2009. It will then review the history of efforts to reform the system, leading up to the proposals of the Redesign Panel issued in August 2006. It will also look at similar initiatives implemented by other intergovernmental organizations to reform their own internal justice systems in recent years. Finally, the article will highlight the main elements of the new administration of justice system, as approved by the General Assembly in 2007-2008, and examine its implications for UN staff members in the future.

A Credibility Gap: The Behrami and Saramati Decision of the European Court of Human Rights

AbstractWith the Behrami and Saramati decision the European Court of Human Rights misses an important opportunity to close the credibility gap in human rights protection during the international administration of territories such as Kosovo. The article criticises the attribution of KFOR acts to the United Nations. It holds that the equation of delegation and attribution as well as the ultimate authority and control test as a criterion for attribution are not in line with UN practice. Instead the article argues in favour of a responsibility of the Troop Contributing Nations. Their responsibility is either based on dual attribution or on the jurisprudence of the Court on the transfer of powers to international organisations. The Court's intention is understandable to protect the universal UN security system by not declaring acts of the Security Council incompatible with European standards. However, it will harm the credibility of UN administration of territories in the long run if collective security concerns prevail over human rights protection. In view of the exercise of quasi-governmental acts by the UN Security Council the article stresses the obligations of ECHR Member States to work towards the establishment of a human rights tribunal on the level of the United Nations.

Kosovo and Metohija: Serbia’s troublesome province

Kosovo and Metohija, the heartland of medieval Serbia, of her culture politics and economy (1204-1455), experienced continuous waves of spiralling violence, forced migration and colonization under centuries-long Ottoman rule (1455-1912). A region which symbolizes the national and cultural identity of the Serbian nation as a whole now has an Albanian majority population, who consider it an ancient Albanian land, claiming continuity with ancient Illyrians. Kosovo was reincorporated into Serbia (1912) and Yugoslavia (1918) as a region lacking tradition of interethnic and interreligious tolerance and cooperation. The two rivalling Kosovo nations, Albanians and Serbs, remained distant, maintaining limited interethnic communication throughout the twentieth century. The mounting national and ideological conflicts, reinforced by the communist ideology made coexistence almost impossible, even after the 1999 NATO bombing campaign and establishment of KFOR-secured UN administration. Kosovo?s unilateral declaration of independence in February 2008 is a dangerous attempt to establish a second Albanian state extended into the heartland of Serbia, a failed state cleansed of both Serbs and other major non-Albanian communities.

Review: Peace at Any Price

PEACE AT ANY PRICE How the World Failed Kosovo Iain King and Whit Mason Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2006. 328pp. US$27.95, cloth (978-0-8014-4539-2).The United Nations interim administration mission in Kosovo (UNMIK) recently entered its ninth and possibly final year as the primary governing authority in Kosovo. Since June 1999, the UN administration has overseen economic, social and political development in the disputed territory, and sought to promote a transformation of the former zone of conflict into a peaceful and multi-ethnic society. Iain King's and Whit Mason's book assesses the performance of the international community in achieving this aim, and presents a comprehensive, illuminating, and often scathing account of the UN's efforts to date.Both authors have close connections to Kosovo, each having held senior political roles within UNMIK, and their insider experience informs the text throughout and adds credibility to their account. From the title of the book onwards, it is clear that this is not a defence of UNMIK, but rather a critique. The authors charge the UN administration, and the international community behind it, with many failings-failing to understand the nature of the conflict between Kosovo Serbs and Albanians, failing to identify the correct solutions, and ultimately failing to fulfil its aim of transforming Kosovo into a multi-ethnic, law-abiding democracy. In particular, the authors allege that UNMIK lost an opportunity to change Kosovo's political culture by neglecting the available levers of soft power, especially in the spheres of education and the media. UNMIK, the authors allege, not only failed to transform and it never even properly tried.Most of this compact but thorough book is taken up with a review of the administration of Kosovo, structured both chronologically and thematically. The four central chapters deal with four separate phases in the administration from 1999 to 2006. Each examines progress in a range of areas, including law and order, security, political developments, hearts and minds, and the economy. The authors locate the roots of many of the ongoing problems in contemporary Kosovo in the first phase of administration, between June 1999 and October 2000. During this period, international authorities displayed a reluctance to clamp down on hardliners, and in particular on the Kosovo Albanian nationalists that reacted to the withdrawal of Serb troops from the territory by initiating a prolonged campaign of revenge violence on the minority Serb community within Kosovo. Much of this revenge violence went unpunished due to international preferences for stability rather than justice, and the low conviction rates contributed to a sense of impunity that the authors suggest was never eradicated in subsequent years. Furthermore, the departure of large sections of the Serb community at the time served to set back the project of a multi-ethnic Kosovo. The second consolidation phase entailed a shift from humanitarian concerns to political development, and included Kosovo's first elections under UNMIK, as well as the establishment of new institutions of self-government. But it was also a period in which many of the physical challenges had been overcome, and the political challenges that remained required changes in local behaviour that UNMIK was unable to achieve. This gave way to a third phase of confrontation and stagnation, where the gap between expectations and the reality on the ground led to local frustration with the international mission. Despite a range of UNMIK initiatives, there was little progress towards resolving Kosovo's political status due to continued divisions within the international community. The dire state of the economy further fuelled local dissatisfaction. This stage culminated in the infamous March riots of 2004, when Albanians turned on Serbs and the international authorities were unable to assert control during two days of violence and looting that left 19 dead, hundreds of Serb homes burnt, and thousands of Serbs displaced. …

Kosovo's Final Status and the Viability of Ongoing International Administration

Since June 1999 Kosovo has been under UN administration pending the determination of its final status. Following the province-wide riots in March 2004 the international administration acknowledged that the ‘standards before status’ policy then being pursued was undermining stability and inter-communal dialogue. Thereafter various ostensibly new initiatives have been implemented to accelerate the process towards final status and the removal of the international administration. This article, however, will demonstrate the continuities between the old and new policies. It will additionally argue that the policies advanced by the Eide Report, the International Commission on the Balkans and the recent Ahtisaari Proposals, regarding the extension of the international administration and the (inconclusive) status of Kosovo threaten stability in the region and do little to resolve the underlying problem.

The Ironies of UN Secretariat Reform

In his last annual report on work of United Nations, Dag Hammarskjold contrasted two views on world organization: members would either regard it static conference machinery or dynamic instrument of Governments through which they ... should also try to develop forms of action. (1) Against background of UN involvement in Congo, which had brought unprecedented tasks but also strong political criticism with it, Hammarskjold wanted to convince member states that second view of organization is in their best interest and in line with UN's mission according to charter. Forty-five years later, Hammarskjold's successor, Kofi Annan, in dramatic appeal to General Assembly, said, Our current rules and regulations were designed for an essentially static Secretariat, whose main function was to service conference and meetings of Member States, and whose staff worked mainly at Headquarters. That is not United of today. (2) Echoing words of Hammarskjold, Annan pointed to large increase in quantity and quality of UN action: Since 1990 alone, forty-two new UN missions were established (compared to mere eighteen missions in preceding forty-four years); instead of 20,000 personnel in field missions, number grew to roughly 80,000, with an expenditure of up to US$5 billion instead of $1.25 billion in 1990. In addition to that, mandates today go as far as temporarily taking over executive functions of government, as Annan underlined in his report Investing in United Nations (IUN). (3) This overall need for reform of Secretariat originating from an expansion of its tasks was reinforced by number of obvious failures in way UN operated. The findings of Independent Inquiry Committee (IIC) into oil-for-food program revealed stunning information on the politicization of decision-making, managerial weaknesses, ethical lapses (4) that characterized UN administration of program. This negative impression received further support from an internal investigation of sexual exploitation and abuse by UN peacekeepers in Democratic Republic of Congo (5) and an internal audit that disclosed serious flaws in UN procurement services. (6) The Outcome Document of UN Summit 2005 therefore stressed need for a culture of organizational accountability, transparency and integrity. (7) However, such superficial concurrence of Secretariat and member state diagnosis did not lead to far-reaching changes in UN's administration. Quite contrary: Secretariat reform became divisive issue that led to spending caps in budget, controversial votes in General Assembly, and lot of personal allegations between main protagonists. Administrative imperatives had turned into political preferences. One reason for that can be found in observation that debate on UN Secretariat reform is characterized by various ironies, notably differences between words and deeds with actions that lead to results contrary to their original aim, and arguments that conceal rather than reveal central aspects of reform issue. Acknowledgment of these ironies may serve to better understand way UN operates. Reform as Modus Operandi The tension between political and administrative work of UN is already planted into consciously ambiguous language of Chapter XV of UN Charter. On one hand, secretary-general is introduced as chief administrative officer according to Article 97; on other hand, Articles 98 and 99, with their vague language (and subject to trust of member states), open up rather remarkable political competences--for example, organizing peacekeeping force, taking stand on various international issues, negotiating for peace, and arguing for allocation of budgetary resources. (8) This context at times leads to situation where much of political criticism aimed at secretary-general inevitably has administrative repercussions, and much of administrative criticism directed at Secretariat has political motivations. …