As the “international community,” journalists, and activists pervert words like “genocide” and “famine” to accuse Israel of war crimes, the United Nations is quietly using its own legal privileges to protect terrorists, rapists, and human-rights abusers in its employ.
Diplomatic immunity — the principle that foreign diplomats are exempt from the legal jurisdiction of the country hosting them — is designed to facilitate international relations by minimizing their fear of arrest or harassment. The United Nations has its own version of this immunity for similar reasons. But the U.N. is using its privileges to derail efforts to prosecute Hamas members, protect criminals, and shield rapists from justice.
The U.N. Charter requires member states to grant the U.N. and related organizations privileges and immunities necessary to fulfill their purposes and, by extension, similar protections for U.N. officials and staff so they can carry out their duties. These rights are specified in the Convention on the Privileges and Immunities of the United Nations.
U.S. courts have historically ruled that the treaty provides immunity unless it is expressly waived. U.N. senior officials, including the secretary-general and assistant secretaries general, enjoy full diplomatic privileges and immunities. More junior U.N. employees, including peacekeepers, have privileges and immunities only in their official capacity. This is known as “functional immunity.”
Several rulings in recent years have clarified that crimes like money laundering, forced labor, and rape cannot be considered official duties. That seems like a welcome — if belated — dose of common sense. But this is the United Nations.
Israel provided extensive evidence that some U.N. staff were directly involved in the October 7 Hamas terrorist attack. The U.N.’s quasi-inspector general, the Office of Internal Oversight Services, investigated and found evidence that at least nine UNRWA employees “may” have been involved. The evidence, however, is decisive.
Those individuals no longer work for UNRWA, but they have not been held to account. The U.N. secretary-general has refused to waive the immunities and privileges they enjoy and asserted these protections to dismiss a lawsuit filed by October 7 victims in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York.
The Biden administration supported the U.N. argument that UNRWA employees also serving Hamas should enjoy immunity. But legally, those immunities should only apply within the scope of legitimate duties. Killing civilians, kidnapping, and rapes committed on October 7 cannot be considered legitimate.
Likewise, sexual exploitation and abuse cannot be considered official acts. The U.N. reported that it received 675 allegations of sexual exploitation and abuse of adults and children in 2024, part of an annual report requested by the U.N. General Assembly since 2004. About half involved U.N. officials, peacekeepers, and personnel. The remainder involved personnel from U.N. implementing partners not under the authority of the U.N.
A U.N.-authored supplementary report details how many cases were investigated, closed, or substantiated. But were privileges and immunities waived or anyone referred for criminal prosecution? Not according to that report.
The U.N. likes to claim that it has “zero tolerance” for such crimes. But it is whistleblowers who are more often punished. Former U.N. Human Rights officer Emma Reilly was targeted after revealing that the U.N. passed information to Beijing on Chinese dissidents. James Wasserstrom, the U.N.’s top anti-corruption officer in Kosovo, was targeted after reporting procurement corruption. Miranda Brown, a senior official in the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, was suspended when she reported child sexual abuse by peacekeepers in the Central African Republic.
The problem is that the U.N. is expected to police itself. Throughout the U.N. system, there are ethics and investigations offices where complaints can be filed and allegations considered. But invariably, the ethics officers and inspectors are appointed by the very people they are supposed to hold accountable.
Too often, this means there is no accountability. Victims and investigators face pressure to bury accusations. Karim Khan, the ICC’s own chief prosecutor, reportedly tried to intimidate his accuser and investigators pursuing a rape charge against him. He later attempted to deflect attention by charging Israeli leaders with war crimes, according to a Wall Street Journal investigation.
Similar abuses plague U.N. peacekeeping operations. Tanzanian peacekeepers credibly accused of sexual exploitation and abuse were repatriated, but never investigated or punished. In 2017, an Associated Press investigation found that more than 100 Sri Lankan peacekeepers ran a child sex ring in Haiti. They, too, were never prosecuted. The problem is so widespread that “sexual abuse by U.N. peacekeepers” has its own Wikipedia page.
White-collar crimes are also rife. Pierre Krahenbuhl, former commissioner-general of UNRWA, was forced out over ethics violations but was rewarded by being hired as the director-general of the International Committee of the Red Cross. Senior officials in the U.N. Office for Project Services were fired for fraud, but only after media reports surfaced and internal red flags were ignored.
The lack of accountability at the United Nations for everything from terrorism to rape and theft is systemic. Without pressure from the United States and other member states, this will continue. Years of shielding wrongdoers behind “privileges and immunities” underscores the need to separate justice for U.N. crimes from those in charge of the U.N.
U.N. organizations should not be trusted to police themselves. The U.N. needs an independent, system-wide external oversight body, led by a director-general elected by the member states, to receive complaints, investigate misconduct, and oversee all internal justice procedures. The secretary-general and other international leaders must clearly state which crimes and what burden of evidence will lead to waiving privileges and immunities. Staff of this new body should be barred from applying for other U.N. jobs for a set cooling-off period.
As it stands, the U.N. is a law unto itself, largely uninterested in rapes, murders, and thefts committed by its staff. The impunity must end.
