When the Syrian civil war erupted in 2011, it had all the makings of a monumental catastrophe. The Secretary-General at the time, Ban Ki-moon, was not the same kind of jet-setting international peace negotiator as his predecessor, Kofi Annan. So Ban made a wise decision: he tapped the former Secretary-General to be his special envoy for Syria. At the time, Annan was riding high as an ex-diplomat, having successfully negotiated a political settlement to a deadly and high-stakes internal confli...
