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.