The Wire

This Wednesday a three-day UN World Summit begins in New York. The summit is aiming to deal with a formidable mountain of issues that need urgent attention. However, several NGOs have voiced concern that negotiations are teetering on the brink of disaster because nation states are simply not reaching agreement as to how issues such as poverty reduction and reform of the United Nations should be addressed. The summit also marks the fifth anniversary of the Millennium conference which set targets for worldwide poverty reduction and increases in western aid to developing countries. Unfortunately, progress in relation to these targets has been far slower than hoped with nations such as Australia refusing to set timetables to meet their obligations. With the UN coming under increasing fire from the Bush administration, the failure of this years summit to achieve any sort of consensus between the 191 nations attending looms as yet another blow to the already fragile institution. Mark Purcell from Oxfam spoke with Tristan Burt about what he saw as being the key issues at this years summit.