Boredom, ranting and clowns: Welcome to the UN’s big bash
The U.N. General Assembly walks a fine line between excitement and tedium.
Picture this: the United Nations General Assembly, a place where the air is thick with monotony, punctuated by bursts of chaos. This year, the title of the most bored attendee at UNGA was awarded to Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa, caught on camera mindlessly scrolling through his phone and posting clips on Instagram during a meeting.
He is not alone in his distraction - in 2012, then-U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was found doodling on her notes during a Security Council meeting, while South Korean lawmaker Yoo Young-ha holds the record for the most creative doodling at a parliamentary audit session, sketching a gorilla on his laptop. But the most entertaining aspect of this year's U.N. event was not just the boredom and inattention, but the choice of music before the arrival of former President Donald Trump and U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio - "Send in the Clowns."
The European Clown Association claimed no involvement in the decision. However, UNGA has seen far more dramatic moments over the years, including a 96-minute rant by Libya's Moammar Gadhafi in 2009, who tore a page from the U.N. Charter during his speech. In 2015, Zimbabwe's Robert Mugabe defended his anti-LGBTQ+ stance by shouting "we are not gays" into the microphone.
Most infuriating of all, the U.N. seemed to be grappling with the same cost-of-living crisis as the rest of the world, using Ikea furniture during a meeting, with a LACK side table placed between Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and Trump.
Written by urgent.news from Politico EU's reporting — not their text. Machine-written — may contain errors; check the original before relying on it.
