Small States and Middle Powers are suddenly Banding Together at the United Nations

Christian Wenaweser is a legend around the United Nations. He has served as Liechtenstein’s Ambassador to the United Nations since 2002 and, despite representing one of the world’s smallest states, has an impressive record of diplomatic achievements. He played an instrumental role in the development of the International Criminal Court, including efforts to define the crime of aggression. He has also spearheaded several important initiatives at the General Assembly, including the creation of a mechanism to collect and preserve evidence of war crimes in Syria and the “veto initiative,” under which any veto at the Security Council triggers a meeting of the General Assembly.

These may sound like fairly technical diplomatic maneuvers, but they represent something much bigger: an innovative way of thinking about how small and middle powers can work together to overcome great-power gridlock and achieve substantive goals at the United Nations.

We spoke one week after UNGA — a defining theme of which was the banding together of small states and middle powers in the face of intransigence from some of the world’s great powers. This included the launch of a new Partnership for Multilateralism and a political declaration on frontier AI, both of which Liechtenstein joined.

In our conversation, Ambassador Wenaweser explains the emerging dynamics of an alliance between middle powers and small states at the UN, what they can actually accomplish, and why they these countries are suddenly asserting themselves.

Our conversation is free for all, and was produced in partnership with [Re]Group, a substack from the UN Foundation. You can watch directly in Substack or listen to the audio-only versions on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts.

Transcript edited for clarity

Mark Leon Goldberg: Welcome to Global Dispatches. I am your host, Mark Leon Goldberg. I am joined today by Liechtenstein’s Ambassador to the United Nations, Christian Wenaweser. Ambassador, welcome.

Christian Wenaweser: Thank you. Good to be with you. Thanks for your interest.

Mark Leon Goldberg: Today’s episode is produced in partnership with [Re]Group, which is a Substack hosted by the United Nations Foundation. And, Ambassador, I want to kick off by noting- correct me if I’m wrong– but you are the longest-serving ambassador to the United Nations of all member states. Is that right?

Christian Wenaweser: That’s correct.

Mark Leon Goldberg: When did you first come to the United Nations?

Christian Wenaweser: I came to the UN literally the last century because I was deputy first. And now I’ve been here as ambassador for 24 years, later this week. I have an anniversary coming up, 1st of October

Mark Leon Goldberg: Well, happy anniversary. As we’re recording this on Tuesday, September 29th, two days ahead of your nearly quarter-century anniversary as perm rep of Liechtenstein to the United Nations, maybe just kick off by asking you, what’s the biggest difference you view between the United Nations of 2002 and the United Nations of today?

Christian Wenaweser: Well, look, when I first started, it was probably the peak and the heyday of multilateralism. And it was a time when sometimes the sky seemed to be the limit. There’s a lot that we were able to do, a lot of standard-setting. We created new institutions. We created the International Criminal Court, the Peacebuilding Commission, the Human Rights Council. And obviously, as you know, today is very, very different. Today is more a fight for multilateralism to remain at the center of policymaking.

Mark Leon Goldberg: As you said, I like that the sky is the limit. I’ve been covering the United Nations not quite as long. I started in 2005. But the biggest difference I see between then and now is that, as you said, there was this kind of infusion of the idea that the United Nations could be the platform to solve a variety of problems, whether that be advancing sustainable development, women’s rights, the idea of human rights expanded to include gay and lesbian and transgender people.

But now we’re at this moment where the scope of what’s possible at the United Nations seems to be shrinking a little bit.

Christian Wenaweser: Yes, that’s totally correct. I think the reality is we’re playing sort of defense on many of these topics and themes. We’re happy right now if we can hold on to what we have. Now, admittedly, we have, in many areas, really, really good and high standards so that the moment comes that we have to defend them is maybe not all that surprising. But it’s a very different time, and we are in a very different policy space.

Mark Leon Goldberg: So we’re speaking just at the end of High-Level Week of UNGA. And fitting along that theme of defending what we have, at the outset of UNGA, there was an op-ed in the Financial Times, co-authored by Mark Carney of Canada, Lula of Brazil, Ruto of Kenya, and von der Leyen of the European Commission, announcing a new partnership for multilateralism. Liechtenstein quickly joined this partnership. Can you explain, what is this thing, and how do you foresee it working?

Christian Wenaweser: We joined so quickly because it is essentially what we have been asking for for a year or so. If you look at our speeches last year, we already said it’s important that the states that we believe are the vast majority of the UN membership, who believe in multilateralism, who believe in international law, that they come together and form an alliance and also overcome the differences that we do have with respect to international law.

But I think the baseline that we can all easily agree on is that A, we want international law, and B, actuall,y a narrative very important for us, we need international law, which is really the case for small states. So, when we saw this happening and after analyzing the declaration, the brief declaration that we were given, which we think is a really good text and less anodyne than these things typically are. So, we felt it was a good moment for us to join. So, we had, I think, a good event on Monday evening.

I don’t know if you were there. But it was a pretty lively, interactive event. We also had speakers on the podium that had not co-authored the op-ed, in particular Brazil. No, not Brazil. In particular, India. Brazil had been a co-author. So, we are hoping that this is the beginning of a beautiful movement. But it’s only been one week, so we’ll see where it can be taken.

Mark Leon Goldberg: Well, that’s sort of my next question. So, you have India, the world’s most populous country, in the same coalition with Liechtenstein, one of the world’s smallest countries; what do you hope that this seemingly incongruent collection of countries can do?

Christian Wenaweser: We are hoping to see an alliance of states that say, “Look, whatever our differences may be, and we have to talk about them, and we have to address them, and maybe we can overcome them, but we all want international law to govern international relations.” I mean, that’s the basic statement for us. And then there are various areas where you see that is necessary. And we would most like to see a movement that has sort of overlapping circles of states that focus on specific issues. So, there’s the issue of use of force, for example, which is at the heart of the throat of the United Nations, clearly under massive pressure today.

Then there’s, for example, the law of the sea cluster that is under pressure now: the Strait of Hormuz, Bab al-Mandab, maybe other waterways, Black Sea. So, with sort of champions among states for specific issues, but a really broad movement behind it supporting that. We think that is how it could most effectively be taken forward.

Mark Leon Goldberg: Well, so it seems like the elephant in the room here is certain actions by larger states, including the United States in Iran, Russia in Ukraine, using force not in accordance with international law. So, what can this collection of small and mid-sized powers do to prevent something like that from happening again, to forestall future breaches of the use of force in violation of international law?

Christian Wenaweser: The main thing is that I think we have been quite complacent and often silenced ourselves on these issues in the last 12, 18 or more months. And I think the first step is to come out of that and to just call out what we see and also have a conversation that at least there is political accountability. That people say, “Okay, well, there’s a use of force going on, clearly. Can we talk about the legality, be it in the Security Council or in the General Assembly?”

And that would be a huge step to just say the Charter says the following — the Charter says the use of force is illegal except in two circumstances: if it’s authorized by the Security Council or if it’s carried out in self-defense. Typically, in the cases that you’ve mentioned, we know there was no authorization by the Security Council. So, if it’s supposed to be legal, it has to be the latter. So, please explain to us how this was self-defense, and let’s have a conversation about that.

If you look at how states have reacted in the past, they have been quite sort of reluctant in a way to really call out what they probably perceive to be violations and have been, in my view, too timid in saying, “Hey, we need to enforce the rules that are in the charter because that’s the foundation of our order.” That’s the first step.

Mark Leon Goldberg: It’s interesting that you characterized, historically, in recent years, there has been this timidity, as you said, in calling out some of the big powers for actions they’ve taken in contravention of international law. And to me, one of the interesting themes I think that ran through UNGA this year was that it seemed to represent almost like a vibe shift in how smaller and middle powers approach these issues.

The timidity that you just described seems no longer to be the dominant narrative. That the advent of this partnership for multilateralism, and other partnerships we’re talking about, seem to have injected this idea that small and middle powers banded together, can have agency and can affect the trajectory of countries’ relationship, international institutions’ relationship with multilateralism. Do you agree that there was this vibe shift?

Christian Wenaweser: I do agree with that. I mean, for us, that’s one of the main takeaways from last week. That’s what we put in our political analysis after High-level Week. It’s what we had been hoping for, for a while. And as I said, we talked about this a year ago. And very glad to see that it’s happening now, because it certainly would have been nice had it been earlier, but certainly not too late.

Mark Leon Goldberg: To what extent do you credit Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney for injecting this kind of new momentum into these new coalitions that are forming around multilateralism and amongst small and medium powers?

Christian Wenaweser: I think he certainly does deserve credit because his speech in Davos was a moment that really galvanized people in a different way. I think, interestingly, he said what a lot of people were thinking, but he said it and he didn’t just think it. And I think that made a difference. But I think also, fair to say, it’s not his baby or creation. It required a lot of people you know to follow up and to come together and say, “Look, we need to come together and take this forward.” I would say catalytic role in a way, maybe not beyond that.

Mark Leon Goldberg: It seems that another manifestation of small and middle powers grouping together to advance multilateralism that we saw last week at UNGA was this remarkable and, to me, sudden political declaration on frontier AI, which Liechtenstein was a signatory. Can you just describe what, first, tell me the backstory of that. How did that come together? And what does that political declaration imply?

Christian Wenaweser: Well, it was co-authored by a number of leaders. And I think the Finnish president in particular has his name on it, and the Norwegian prime minister. These are countries we feel very close t,o and they’re our close partners. I mean, again, I think they kind of put together what people are just thinking anyway.

I don’t know the entire backstory. It was probably accelerated by the very rapid developments that happened immediately before High-Level Week with the talk that, oh, now we’re all going to die because of AI and the CEOs coming out with their statement. And this became a dominant theme of High-Level Week, really. I mean, the Security Council meeting on this with the CEOs is one of the more remarkable meetings that the Security Council has had. So, the statement essentially says we’re not doomers, so we see the positive potential that AI has, but there are enormous risks, and we want to see guardrails and regulation, which I think is, for us, the baseline common sense approach to this.

And that’s also why we joined it relatively quickly. It will be interesting to see where this is taken, because this is an area that is a bit different than other areas because the reality is the AI conversation, of course, is dominated by two states, really. And they have both not shown any interest so far in doing what we are asking for.

Mark Leon Goldberg: And specifically, what are you asking for?

Christian Wenaweser: Well, what I said guardrails and take seriously the calls that have come from the industry themselves, and think about regulation together, really, just the beginning of a conversation. So, the question here is, who is affected by AI? The answer is very simple. It’s all of us to varying degrees. But ultimately, we’re all very strongly affected so we should all be part of the conversation. I think that the declaration, more than anything else, is an ask to say we don’t want to be on the menu; we want to be at the table.

Mark Leon Goldberg: So, you did note that two countries, China and the United States, dominate the industry, but so dominate it that very few other countries have much to do with frontier AI. I guess I kind of come back to that question earlier I posed about how middle and small powers banding together might affect the trajectory of how larger powers decide to use force. In this instance, how tactically might these small and middle powers- there’s over 20 of them right now that have signed this declaration- actually affect the trajectory of AI development, understanding that it falls really squarely within the remit of these two countries?

Christian Wenaweser: No, I mean, look, I think that is the question. Because, as I said, it’s quite a different scenario than in other areas. If you talk about the use of force, you can say, “Look, here’s this little blue book. It’s called The Charter of the United Nations. You have signed on to this. Can we just talk about if what you’re doing is legal?” Here you have nothing. Here you’re asking for something that those who control the conversation at this point don’t want. So, I think numbers are certainly important. So, we need to have many more states to say we want this one way or the other, and we have to try to bring the UN into the conversation.

I think that’s going to be very hard, to be honest. At the moment, there is more of us, then we have a better way of exploring what our leverage actually is. Because so far, in my view, our leverage is extremely limited. We can say what we think is right, and we can say all these other people and people who know more about this than we do have said the same thing. So, certainly the call has a certain power behind it, but we certainly need more numbers to find out what our actual leverage is.

Mark Leon Goldberg: So, one of the points of this political declaration was to begin discussions on a potential new international institution to regulate or prevent AI disasters in one way or another. Didn’t get very specific on what this international institution might do, but the idea, it seems, is to have some sort of international institution that might prevent the excesses of AI from destroying humanity. Seems like a good idea. You’ve been there for the start of other institutions. You mentioned the International Criminal Court before.

You were there at the very founding of it. How do you foresee the advent of a new international institution to regulate AI in one way or another?

Christian Wenaweser: I think the analogy that was given by the president, still, I believe it was, was the IAEA. And he said we would love to set up something that is analogous to IAEA. So, the Atomic Energy Agency that oversees control of nuclear proliferation, nuclear weapons. He also said, yeah, but I guess that’s not going to be possible. But he said that’s the ideal and that’s the vision, and that’s what we should aim for.

And I think we should think about together those who believe that should be done, how that could look like and take the conversation from what is relatively abstract now to something more concrete. That does not mean it’s going to happen. It also doesn’t mean that we can start a process inside the UN because right now, in my view, politically, we don’t have the support that we require to start a process in the UN.

But I think it’s important to also explain to people what that actually would do and how that would look like because the reality is a lot of policymakers are out of their depth here. Very few people are AI experts. And they have to rely on what they are given by those who know more, and the advice given is not unified. You hear everybody here from the CEOs who spoke in the Security Council, you also hear different things from other CEOs or from other people.

So, it’s a question of also getting solid, reliable information and explain things better to people.

Mark Leon Goldberg: So, UNGA is really the start of a year at the General Assembly. I’m curious to learn from you, what are some of your priorities as this year at the United Nations, the 81st Assembly, gets started?

Christian Wenaweser: Well, the so-called UN80 process is for us a high priority. And that’s the process that SG Guterres launched to make the UN leaner, more effective, more relevant. And that’s a process that is on the way. We think it’s enormously important. We very strongly believe in the UN. We think the UN is irreplaceable and indispensable. But we’re also very critical of parts of its performance.

And we all know that the UN is not a very efficient organization in terms of human resources, in terms of financial resources, and that we can do better. But we are not looking at this as a cost-cutting exercise. We don’t think the UN is too expensive. We think the UN is not focused sufficiently on what it should be doing and what people actually expect the UN to do. So, we’re doing a lot in our daily business that I don’t think people in this call find interesting, let alone our parliamentarians or other people.

Mark Leon Goldberg: I love it. I’m a UN nerd, though. It’s my favorite thing to talk about, UN reform.

Christian Wenaweser: No. UN reform, but you’re probably not excited about the International Day of the Potato or things that happen in the General Assembly. So, we think for us, the UN is a peace organization. And I think that’s what people feel the UN is at its core. And we think the UN has failed too often and too regularly, in a way, in efforts to create peace and security. And I think the reality is the UN has almost given up on that.

And we should not accept that. And we should say we want to see a political UN. We want to see a UN that plays a role in the major conflicts of the world. We want to see a UN that puts a situation like Sudan on the agenda in a different way than it is now; that plays the role that it has under historic terms in the Middle East and so on. So, we want the UN enabled to do this. And we also want to see a secretary general who takes a leading role in this respect.

Mark Leon Goldberg: Well, Ambassador, thank you so much for your time. This was helpful.

Christian Wenaweser: Great. Pleasure to be here. Thank you for inviting me.

Mark Leon Goldberg: And just a note to those of us who joined live — we will be editing the two videos together, apologies for the technical difficulty, later in this week. Subscribe to Global Dispatches and to [Re]Group Playbook to receive that video and this conversation in full when it’s ready later this week. But thank you all, and thank you, Ambassador.

Christian Wenaweser: Great. Great seeing you, Mark. All the best.