Japan will not oppose Ban Ki-moon’s bid to become the next UN Secretary General: a bad idea

The Japan Times and Japan Today are reporting that the Japanese do not intend to block South Korean foreign minister Ban Ki-moon’s attempt to become the next Secretary General of the United Nations:

Japan will declare its support for South Korean Foreign Affairs and Trade Minister Ban Ki Moon to become the next United Nations secretary general if he draws no opposition from the five permanent Security Council members in a straw poll Monday, government sources said.

Tokyo has said it will support an Asian to succeed Ghanian Kofi Annan in line with the de facto rotation rule for the top U.N. post, but it had not said which Asian it would back, preferring to wait for results of informal polls in the Security Council.

There has been opposition within the government to supporting the South Korean candidate in light of Seoul’s opposition to Japan’s effort to obtain a permanent seat on the Security Council, the sources said.

But Ban’s strong lead among the Asian candidates is leaving it with no other option, they said.

Foreign Minister Taro Aso has hinted that Prime Minister Shinzo Abe may convey Japan’s support for Ban when he meets with South Korean President Roh Moo Hyun. The two leaders are expected to hold their first summit next Monday.

As a top contributor of funds to the United Nations (second only to the United States), you’d think that Japan might try to use it’s position to block Ban Ki-moon. Instead, they are on the verge of giving full support to his election. Why?

I would guess that the Japanese government probably thinks it can improve relations with South Korea if it allows Ban to be elected. Maybe the South Korean government has secretly agreed to tone down its anti-Japanese ultranationalism in exchange for Japan’s support on the UN bid? Or perhaps, as the the article says, the Japanese government is caving in the face of such strong international support for Ban. Whatever the exact reason may be, I believe that the Japanese are making a big mistake.

There is nothing to suggest that Japanese support for Ban Ki-moon’s election will do anything to tone down anti-Japanese sentiment in South Korea. Jumping on the bandwagon of Ban supporters is unlikely reverse decades of anti-Japanese nationalism in South Korea. Furthermore, Ban Ki-moon’s has spent his tenure as foreign minister fanning the flames of anti-Japanese ultranationalism by helping to bring the Yasukuni and Dokdo/Takeshima issues to the forefront of Japanese/Korean relations (he even wears Dokdo neckties). Ban has advanced a foreign policy agenda that has destroyed South Korea’s alliance with the United States and sent millions of dollars of aid to North Korea (while turning a blind eye to North Korean human rights abuses). For a great example of his sense of reasonable diplomacy, you might want to read this post.

The last thing the UN needs at this point is an uncivil anti-American/anti-Japanese secretary general to alienate the two nations that provide almost half of its funding (Japan is already in the process of decreasing its funding to an ungrateful UN. After Ban becomes the Secretary General, I think we can expect further drops.). Now that Japan has refused to block Ban’s election, that is almost guaranteed to happen. It might be bad news for Japanese/U.S. interests in the UN, but look on the bright side: the blogging community is going to get plenty of new material for inflammatory posts.

[For a great case on why the United States should not support Ban Ki-moon's election, read this post at the Korea Liberator.]