NEW DELHI · 18 SEPTEMBER 2026

The UN: Reality and Future

Dr. Eun-Ju Kim · Book launch and special forum

The UN Reality and Future

Global Dialogue on Public Trust in the United Nations

Hon’ble Justice Lokur, Mr. Singh, Excellencies, distinguished panellists and judges, members of the legal and telecommunications communities, diplomats, UN colleagues, friends, members of the media, and especially the students and future leaders with us today: thank you very much for joining us.

I am delighted to be back in India for the launch of this newly published book and for this forum, which forms part of a wider series of Global Dialogues.

Some have asked me: why India?

India is a very special country to me, both personally and professionally. It is the country where Mahatma Gandhi led a historic non-violent movement for independence, justice, and human dignity - a legacy that continues to inspire the world. Professionally, as ITU Regional Director for Asia and the Pacific, I had the privilege of serving India and 40 other countries across the region for 13 years, until 2013. India is also deeply personal to me, as I am married to an Indian who has been a major source of strength and support throughout this journey.

Moreover, India is a centre of intellectual and legal courage, with a strong tradition of engaging with questions concerning not only the UN, but also accountability, justice, and the rule of law.

Today, the UN faces serious external and internal challenges to public trust, and voices are calling for reform at multiple levels.

As the UN prepares to elect its next Secretary-General, public discussion focuses mainly on the UN’s structure and functions. I would like to examine a more specific and often overlooked dimension - its internal governance - through six main questions. These questions are not abstract. They emerged from a real institutional journey documented in the book and from five judgments of the Administrative Tribunal of the International Labour Organization, or ILOAT. These judgments provide independent judicial records against which the institutional story can be examined.

1 Why did I spend my life believing that the UN could help build a better world

First, did you - or do you - have a dream? My story began much earlier, with a dream. When I was young, I believed that international cooperation could make the world better.

I grew up believing that peace should be stronger than conflict and war, because Korea, then one of the world’s poorest countries, had itself endured war in the 1950s; that cooperation should be stronger than confrontation; and that institutions such as the UN could provide a place where countries - especially those of the Global South - might work together for humanity and the collective good in an interdependent and interconnected world.

That aspiration shaped my studies. It led me to study communications policy and international institutions - especially the UN - and eventually the International Telecommunication Union, ITU, a UN specialized agency established in 1865 to connect the unconnected world.

Later, it became my profession. For more than three decades, I served in and with ITU: first as a national delegate from the Republic of Korea, then as a representative of a UK Sector Member, and later as a staff member in Asia and the Pacific and in Geneva.

I saw first-hand the extraordinary contribution that international organizations can make. ITU connects countries through spectrum, satellite orbits, telecommunications standards, digital development and, increasingly today, artificial intelligence. One simple example is India’s country code, +91, which all of you use every day.

I saw technologies evolve over the decades, cross borders, and reach into space. I saw countries that disagreed politically still cooperate technically. And I saw how international institutions can genuinely improve lives.

That is why this book is not against the UN. It is a book written because I still believe in the UN. But belief also brings responsibility. When we care deeply about an institution, we must be prepared to ask whether its internal practices reflect the principles it promotes to the world.

2 What happens when the UN does not practise internally the principles it promotes to the world

Over time, my experience raised a more difficult question: what happens when an institution, or an executive head, promotes the rule of law, accountability, transparency, and good governance externally, but does not consistently apply those principles within its own organization?

This book, Public Trust in the United Nations, examines that question through ITU as a case study. It considers how authority is exercised; how investigations are initiated or refused; whether applicable rules are applied equally at all levels; whether revised rules are applied consistently; how decisions are made and reviewed; how conflicts of interest are managed; and how accountability operates when allegations concern senior or elected officials.

One broader lesson is that where authority is highly concentrated, independent procedures become essential. Without sufficient independence, transparency, and safeguards, even a formally valid structure may create conditions in which power can be exercised without adequate challenge - especially when allegations concern officials connected to geopolitically influential Member States.

This does not mean that every incorrect decision proves abuse of authority, nor that every procedural failure proves bad faith. But where serious errors recur after the governing rule has been clarified, where the same rules are applied differently, or where mandatory investigations are not conducted or lack structural independence, the possibility of abuse, misuse, or an unaccountable exercise of authority can no longer be ignored.

That is where governance becomes a matter of public trust. As many of you are legal professionals, let me offer one concrete example from the book.

Judgment No. 4832 annulled the decision, finding that it resulted from an unlawful investigative process that violated due-process requirements. That raises a question: why was such an additional unlawful process introduced? The Judgment did not determine the motive behind that process. The book therefore asks whether the unlawful process and decision were used to shift accountability for broader failures in internal governance and to attempt to remove a senior official.

Those broader questions are examined in the book through documentary evidence, allegations, and governance analysis, while remaining distinct from the findings expressly made by ILOAT.

This was the point at which an internal administrative story became a question of institutional legality, with financial and reputational consequences for the parties and wider stakeholders - including the organization, its staff, Member States, and ultimately the public: the taxpayers who fund it.

3 What happened in ITU and then ILOAT

From the initial administrative decision, through internal proceedings, and ultimately to an ILOAT judgment, the process can take four or five years - or longer.

That is why few staff members initiate the process, especially given the high legal costs. As detailed in the book, it has now been more than seven years since this story began in 2019.

ILOAT is not a national court, but it performs an essential judicial function for international civil servants. Most of the interconnected decisions examined in this book were annulled or set aside by the Tribunal. Although the unlawful decision was eventually set aside, it took more than four years to correct it.

That passage of time is part of the story, because delayed correction can itself prolong institutional, professional, and personal harm. The judgments included findings concerning due process, essential evidence, the lawfulness of administrative procedures, and the failure to carry out mandatory investigations.

Yet one important question remained unanswered: why were these unlawful decisions made in the first place - and why were related failures repeated? Because ITU failed to conduct the mandatory investigations, not merely once but repeatedly, even after revising the applicable rule, the Tribunal could not determine the underlying factual allegations or whether misconduct occurred.

This is precisely where the limits of administrative justice become particularly important. I wrote this book because these judgments reach far beyond one individual or one organizational case.

A judgment can reveal much more than who won or lost. It can tell us whether an organization followed its own law; whether required procedures or investigations were respected; whether decision-makers acted within their authority; whether an unlawful decision was corrected; and, importantly, why the same problem was allowed to happen again.

When judgments are read not one by one, but collectively and over time, they can serve as an institutional health check. They reveal patterns. And patterns tell us something about governance. That is where administrative justice, the rule of law, and accountability meet.

That is why the book reads the five principal judgments as one institutional chronology, rather than as isolated cases.

4 What are the limits of ILOAT

One of the book’s most important lessons is that ILOAT has limits. This is an area in which Justices and Member States, especially Ambassadors, may wish to share insights from their experience with the United Nations internal justice system.

For international civil servants, ILOAT is especially significant because, in practical terms, it is their last judicial resort. Its independence and effectiveness are therefore vital.

But ILOAT remains a tribunal with a defined jurisdiction. It decides the particular legal dispute before it. It does not function as a criminal investigator. It is not an audit body or a parliamentary inquiry. And it does not automatically conduct the fact-finding that an organization itself failed to undertake.

This is also a relatively little-known area that receives limited attention from the wider public and media, although the issues may apply to many public organizations.

In some cases, the Tribunal may determine whether a procedure was lawful without deciding the underlying merits of the allegations that gave rise to it. Nor can the Tribunal recreate, years later, the investigation that should have been conducted at the outset.

Judgment No. 5118 illustrates this accountability gap very clearly. The Tribunal held that ITU had unlawfully failed to conduct the formal investigation required by the rule then in force, and had knowingly rejected it in an attempt to apply a later rule retroactively to the earlier complaint.

Consequently, the Tribunal did not determine whether the underlying allegations of abuse of authority and harassment were substantiated. Instead, it compensated the complainant for losing the right to a proper and thorough investigation. The legal wrong was therefore identified.

By contrast, the complainant was repeatedly investigated and subjected to procedures later found unlawful by ILOAT, in repeated efforts to establish individual fault. Yet the allegations concerning the elected official were never subjected to the mandatory investigation required by the Organization’s own rule. That is the accountability gap on which I hope the panellists, lawyers, and esteemed participants can offer their perspectives.

Thus, even after multiple favourable judgments, annulled decisions, and compensation, fundamental questions may remain: What actually happened? Who was responsible? Why were the mandatory investigations repeatedly rejected? And what institutional lessons should follow?

The story did not stop there. Judgment No. 5213 records that the same original complaint generated two preliminary reviews, two internal processes, two internal appeals, two Appeal Board reports, two complaints before the Tribunal, and ultimately two judgments - Nos. 5118 and 5213 - which annulled the repeatedly unlawful decisions. The Tribunal observed that this burden should not have occurred.

At that point, the issue is no longer simply the cost of one dispute. It raises broader questions about the independence of the internal justice mechanism, especially internal oversight and appeal bodies whose staff and members are appointed by, and remain under the administrative authority of, the executive head.

It also raises concerns about potential conflicts of interest, duplication of proceedings, legal finality, institutional learning, and the responsible use of public resources. I would therefore invite our distinguished panellists and participants to consider two questions.

First, can members of an internal Appeal Board or of the Independent Management Advisory Committee genuinely be independent when reviewing cases that directly concern the executive head under whose authority they serve?

Second, should the applicable rules be revised to require independent external members in cases directly involving the executive head or other elected officials?

There is another dimension. By the time the legal process concludes, the original decision-maker may no longer be in office. Yet no separate mechanism may have established personal accountability for the underlying conduct.

More remarkably, the official whose alleged conduct was never subjected to the mandatory investigation is seeking another term of office, while the allegations remain unresolved. That raises a fundamental governance question: should unresolved accountability simply disappear with the passage of time, or should it matter when Member States are asked once again to entrust that official with public authority?

When a legal system can identify that not one but multiple decisions were unlawful, but cannot fully answer why they happened and were repeated, who was responsible, and how recurrence will be prevented, judicial correction alone may not be enough to rebuild public trust.

Esteemed lawyers, diplomats, and UN colleagues, in your view, should these systemic concerns be examined by the United Nations internal justice system, or a similar mechanism, with a view to recommending appropriate safeguards and reforms across the UN system - particularly as the UN prepares for its forthcoming leadership transition?

5 Why should the public care

From these judgments and experiences, I draw six broader messages that, I believe, deserve public attention.

First, the rule of law must begin inside the institution itself. An international organization cannot credibly promote rules externally if its own rules can be disregarded internally.

Second, independence matters most where authority is concentrated. The more senior the person concerned, the stronger - not weaker - the safeguards for independent investigation and review should be.

Third, repeated unlawful decisions are not merely legal technicalities. When substantially similar failures recur, the issue is no longer simply whether one individual decision was wrong. The question becomes whether the institution is learning from those failures and correcting its internal control systems.

Fourth, authority and accountability must remain connected. Public authority is entrusted by Member States. Authority cannot be separated from responsibility, and accountability must carry meaningful consequences.

Fifth, remedies must be meaningful. A successful judgment does not automatically repair professional, financial, reputational, or personal harm. Justice requires implementation and the prevention of recurrence.

Sixth, judgments should not disappear into institutional archives. They should be acted upon and studied by governing bodies, Member States, researchers, the media, and the public.

For my part, as a concrete commitment, I am contributing the compensation I receive pursuant to the judgments to support this series of dialogues, beginning here in India, and to advance our shared vision of building a better world together through the United Nations.

Judgments are not only records of disputes. They can also serve as evidence of institutional performance and governance.

Judgment No. 5214 adds an equally important caution. According to the ruling, repeated unlawful decisions or inappropriate conduct do not, without more, prove harassment or abuse of authority. That distinction matters. It is precisely why credible independent fact-finding, clear thresholds, and conflict-of-interest safeguards are essential when serious allegations concern leadership.

6 Can public trust in the UN be rebuilt

This brings me to the final and most important point: what do we do with these lessons? The purpose of this book is not simply to identify failures. It is to ask how institutions can become stronger.

I believe public trust can be rebuilt within the UN system. But trust must be earned through visible institutional behaviour, particularly by its leadership.

There are several practical steps. International organizations should make the implementation of judgments more transparent. They should show what corrective action was taken, by whom, and whether the same problem recurred. Investigations involving senior or elected officials should be structurally independent. Conflicts of interest must be identified and managed transparently.

Repeated adverse judgments should trigger an institutional review, rather than merely another payment from organizational funds. ITU’s External Auditors considered such payments legal, even though the funds ultimately derive from Member State contributions and therefore from public resources.

Member States should examine not only mandates and budgets, but also internal justice, investigations, legal costs, recurring governance failures, and the implementation of judicial decisions.

Where serious personal responsibility is independently established through due process, institutions should have mechanisms to consider accountability that go beyond simply transferring the financial consequences to the organization - and ultimately to Member States and taxpayers.

Above all, organizations must become learning institutions, and their staff must be able to share their experiences in support of reform and renewed trust in the UN. There should be no correction without learning, and no learning without measurable change.

For me, this is the positive significance of jurisprudence grounded in objective and substantiated evidence.

A judgment should not be treated merely as the closing of a case file. It should serve as evidence for institutional learning: what failed, why it failed, what was corrected, and how recurrence will be prevented. Only then can legal correction lead to governance reform - and governance reform strengthen public trust.

For this purpose, I would like to put forward an idea: could a mechanism for measuring institutional trust - such as a UN Public Trust Index - be developed?

If so, could an institution or university in India lead this initiative and thereby contribute to rebuilding public trust in the UN? India has a deep legal and intellectual tradition, a strong judiciary, and a large democratic public sphere led by a young generation committed to justice, accountability, and the rule of law.

That is why I am especially pleased that this dialogue begins here in Delhi and will continue in Seoul next month.

Let me return to where I began. As a child, I dreamed of contributing to a better world.

For many years, I believed that serving within the UN system was one way of doing that. I still believe so, as I meet many young people - and even their parents - who continue to aspire to serve the UN, its missions, and its values. But today I understand that serving the UN also means being willing to examine it critically, constructively, and transparently.

The future of the UN depends not only on the values written in its Charter. It depends on whether those values are lived within its institutions and by its leadership. It depends not only on who leads, but on how authority is exercised. It depends not only on judgments being issued, but on whether institutions learn from and implement them.

Ultimately, it depends on whether Member States, international civil servants, courts, diplomats, scholars, students, journalists, and the public are willing to take informed ownership of the institutions created in their name.

The UN remains necessary. Precisely because it is necessary, it must also remain lawful, accountable, transparent, and worthy of public trust.

That is the story of this book. And that is the dialogue I hope we can carry forward today as we work together to rebuild public trust in the UN.

Thank you very much for your kind attention. I look forward to our dialogue and, I hope, to your joining this journey and the action that follows - for a better world and in the interests of future generations.