THE United Nations panel of “wise men” has done one particularly brave thing in a report that stands out for the caustic criticism of the organisation and the blunt lecture about the urgency of reform.

That is to attempt a definition of terrorism, a perennial controversy that frustrates all kinds of international treaties.

Islamic countries have objected to past attempts most loudly, arguing that “national liberators” (in the West Bank, Kashmir and now Iraq) should not be labelled terrorists.

But the panel’s definition is unambiguous on that point, encompassing “any definition that is intended to cause death or serious bodily harm to civilians or non-combatants, when the purpose of such an action . . . is to intimidate a population (or sway) a government or international organisation.”

If the definition secures agreement, it can be counted a step forward. So can the panel’s fierce attack on many UN practices. The 16-member panel was set up by Kofi Annan, the Secretary-General, to address the UN’s shortcomings in the wake of the Iraq rift. It has performed a huge public service by criticising the Human Rights Commission in Geneva, which has signed up offenders such as Libya and Sudan. The Commission, which has built up a “credibility deficit”, undermines the “overall reputation of the UN”, it finds.

The panel also criticises the “dead wood” in the upper ranks and proposes early retirement.

But one of its most controversial proposals risks sinking the whole: the expansion of the Security Council to 24 members from 15. Different models have been knocking around for months, and the panel itself has been unable to settle on one. But the row over the membership — and any new voting procedures — could rival that over the European Constitution.

Yukos: Worse to come?

WITH the final dismemberment of Yukos, is the Kremlin’s assault on private business over? No.

President Putin, who has denied a campaign to renationalise assets sold off in the first rush of privatisation, has now all but admitted that other oligarchs, who made towering fortunes in that scrambled sale, might now be targets.

“Unfortunately, it is still true” that oligarchs still hold a grip on the State, he said on Tuesday. “We are fighting this and will continue to fight this.”

The Kremlin’s attack on Yukos, the most Westernised of Russia’s large companies, has now reached the point of no return. The announcement by Gazprom, the state-controlled giant, that it would bid for Yukos’s most valuable assets at a knockdown price seals its fate.

Investment analysts have worked hard to portray Yukos as a one-off. The relentlessly optimistic team at United Financial Group argued this week that “systematic state expropriation risk is negligible”.

True, Mikhail Khodorkovsky, Yukos’s founder, presented an embryonic threat to Putin’s power, by funding opposition groups and talking of running for President himself. It is disingenuous of Putin to argue that “Khodorkovsky . . . was never a parliament deputy . . . he never headed a political party . . . so it is wrong to cast the criminal side of this case as political”.

An announcement that Khodorkovsky, in jail since October last year, will stay there at least until February 14, as he is tried on fraud and tax evasion charges, is a warning to other heroes of the “international community”. In January 2003, Khodorkovsky was the toast of Davos, that rarified summit for the foreign policy tribe, but that has done nothing to save him.

After Putin’s remarks this week, it is hard to be confident that less well-known tycoons will not also come under threat.

Blunkett ‘is no Edward VIII’

IF DAVID BLUNKETT is looking for respite from his predicament, he could do worse than escape to India, where the press, which has been ambivalent about his record in office, has taken a benign view of his personal troubles. “This case has no parallels to that of King Edward’s love for Mrs Simpson, which led to his abdication in 1936,” The Hindustan Times observes.

The Home Secretary “appears to be in deep trouble” all the same, it concludes, but the implication is that he should not have to resign because of his American lover.

Any Home Secretary comes under intense scrutiny by the media on the subcontinent, given the size of the community in Britain and the particular interest in visas, immigration, forced marriages and racism. But Blunkett has provoked more than his recent predecessors because of his aggressive approach to his portfolio.

The “no-nonsense Home Secretary”, as The Hindustan Times calls him, has received praise for his crackdown on racism in the police and for celebrating Diwali, but has been chided for his stance on immigration and identity cards.

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