WHO’s WHO – Annalena Baerbock: President of the UN General Assembly who selectively respects UN resolutions

​​​​​​​Former German Foreign Minister and unsuccessful chancellor candidate Annalena Baerbock has been elected as the new President of the United Nations General Assembly in a secret ballot. What is not a secret, however, is that she has thus far selectively respected UN Security Council resolutions and publicly conditioned Serbia’s EU membership on the recognition of Kosovo.

"Conflicts, climate disasters, poverty, and inequality continue to challenge the human family. Distrust and divisions are widespread," said UN Secretary-General António Guterres in his welcoming speech.

Baerbock was elected by secret ballot, reportedly at the insistence of Russia, according to German media citing diplomatic sources.

She received the support of 167 countries, while 14 abstained.

The former foreign minister was Germany’s candidate for the presidency of the 80th session of the UN General Assembly.

Insiders claim this move was forced after her party lost the elections.

In 2021, Baerbock ran as the Green Party’s candidate for chancellor—the first woman ever nominated for the position since the party's founding.

Her political career has been accompanied by a series of controversies, but just as she once successfully competed as a trampoline gymnast in her youth, she managed to bounce back from these issues as well.

In her book Now – How We Renew Our Country, published in June 2021, it was revealed that 12 paragraphs were plagiarized.

This was pointed out by “plagiarism hunter” Stefan Weber, an Austrian media expert, but the Greens dismissed the accusations as slander.

The issue was resolved when Baerbock promised to include proper citations in later editions.

That same year, a few months earlier, the media revealed that Baerbock had failed to report to the German parliament’s administration a total of €25,500 in additional income she received from 2018 to 2020 as party chair.

That issue was also “smoothed over,” but she still did not become chancellor. Olaf Scholz won and appointed her as foreign minister in his cabinet, a position she held until her party’s electoral defeat this year.

One matter that could not be smoothed over involves her grandfather, Waldemar Baerbock.

After delivering several emotional speeches in which she reminisced about her childhood and grandfather, the Bunte portal published the military dossier of Colonel Baerbock.

It stated that during the war, he served in an engineering unit responsible for repairing anti-aircraft guns.

However, it later emerged that he was a “staunch National Socialist” who was awarded the War Merit Cross with Swords in 1944.

Annalena Baerbock later explained that she was unaware of this when speaking publicly about her grandfather.

Western Balkans and the EU

Baerbock has visited the Western Balkans on several occasions.

During a visit to Tirana in October 2023, she stated that “preserving security is crucial for the progress of the Western Balkans on its European path.”

She emphasized that anyone wishing to join the EU must respect territorial integrity and understand that security is a shared concern.

Due to her interpretation of respecting territorial integrity, and previous UN Security Council resolutions, official Belgrade has reacted on multiple occasions.

“As for international law and stability, based on what criteria do you decide which UNSC Resolution must be respected and which one should be ignored? For example, in the case of Libya, Resolution 2571 must be followed, but in Serbia’s case, Resolution 1244 is to be ignored? A staggering level of absurdity,” then-Prime Minister Ana Brnabic said in response to Baerbock’s assertion that the return of the Serbian Army to Kosovo was unacceptable.

Following a 2022 meeting in Berlin with Kosovo Foreign Minister Donika Gërvalla, Baerbock made her stance abundantly clear: Serbia cannot join the EU without recognizing Kosovo.

“As the German government, we have a very, very clear position on recognition,” Baerbock stated.

She added that Germany is actively working toward EU membership for all Western Balkan countries and that this entails mutual recognition.

From Trampoline to Politics

Baerbock was born in 1980 in Hanover—the same year the Green Party was founded.

According to past interviews, she often attended anti-war and anti-nuclear protests with her parents.

As a teenager, she trained in gymnastics and competed in trampoline events.

She participated in several national competitions and won three bronze medals.

In one interview, she said she learned a great deal from the sport, especially trampoline jumping.

She claimed that the sport taught her discipline and courage, that every victory includes a loss, and that nothing can be achieved without teamwork.

“Above all, you must be able to assess yourself accurately, to know your strengths and limitations,” she told German media.

Her official biography states that she completed her studies in political science and international public law in 2005 at the University of Hamburg and the London School of Economics and Political Science.

For the next three years, she built her career in politics—first as an advisor to Elisabeth Schroedter, a then-MEP, and later as a foreign and security policy advisor in the Alliance 90/The Greens parliamentary group in the European Parliament.

Since 2013, she has served as a member of the Bundestag and was co-leader of the Greens from 2018 to 2022.

She is married and has two daughters.