by Stefano Vaccara
NEW YORK (UNITED STATES) (ITALPRESS) – At the United Nations Glass Palace, in front of over 150 officials, ambassadors and diplomatic representatives, the Italian Mission celebrated 70 years of Italy at the UN with an evening dedicated to Italian cuisine and, above all, to greeting Ambassador Maurizio Massari, who concludes his mandate as head of the mission of Italy at the beginning of the new year. An elegant celebration, also designed to enhance the success of Italian cuisine, now recognized as a World Heritage Site by UNESCO, but above all a moment full of political significance: the farewell to a diplomat who, in the last four and a half years, has been one of the most coherent and firm voices in defense of multilateralism and international law. As the images that ran through seven decades of Italian presence at the United Nations flowed on the screen, Massari reiterated what was the guiding thread of his post: the total and convinced commitment of Italy towards the UN. Taking up the words of President Sergio Mattarella, he defined the Organization “a precious and irreplaceable tool for peace”, stating the confidence that the future of the United Nations will depend on the choices of the Member States, “all united by the desire of a more stable, prosperous and safe world”.
Words, however, arrive at a dramatic moment for the UN. The crisis of resources, acute by the decision of the Trump administration to “stack the plug” on the financial level and – perhaps even more serious – on the legal and moral one, put the most important multilateral organization in one of the most difficult stages of its history. Just as the crisis continues in Ukraine, Gaza and Sudan, the Glass Palace is forced to operate with reduced budgets and an increasing disinterest of the major powers for the multilateral system. In this context, Massari’s work takes on a particular weight. During his term, the Neapolitan diplomat was President of the First Commission, Vice-President of the ECOSOC, a member of the Executive Board of UN Women and the CERF Advisory Group. Above all, he was an untiring defender of Ukraine since February 2022, reiterated at all times the centrality of international law and the need to reject any attempt to change the boundaries with force. Massari, who in his previous experience in Brussels had to deal with the slow and excessive bureaucracy of the EU, supported the ongoing attempt by UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres to streamline the pathetic apparatus he drives.
But one thing is to make multilateral organization more efficient by means of targeted and necessary cuts, all the other is to deny it the necessary resources to continue to carry out its essential functions of maintaining peace, supporting development and defence of human rights. Massari’s contribution to Italy’s interests to the UN was not only technical-diplomatic, but political in the noblest sense of the term: has embodied a vision of Italy as a country that is not limited to participating in multilateralism, but nourishes it and defends it. In these difficult years, Massari reminded – to colleagues, Member States and also to us journalists – that without shared rules and without a place to make them live, the international system inevitably slips towards the chaos and violence of the strongest. The evening at the Glass Palace was therefore more than a tribute to a diplomat leaving: was the celebration of an idea of Italy in the world. And, in filigree, the passage of witness at a time when the UN more than ever needs credible, coherent and deeply conscious voices of the value of international cooperation. The new permanent representative of Italy to the UN in New York, who will be in the middle of January of the new year, will be Giorgio Marrapodi, former ambassador in Turkey.
– photo xo9/Italpress –
(ITALPRESS).
