UNITED NATIONS
\nPakistan has called for evolving a \u201cmodel\u201d for restructuring the UN Security Council through patient exchanges, mutual accommodation and compromise acceptable to the widest possible majority of member states, saying that any other course of action would lead to a \u201cdead-end\u201d.
\n\u201cWe remain opposed to attempts to steer member states towards solutions imposed by votes and majorities,\u201d Ambassador Munir Akram told delegates when the long-running Inter-Governmental Negotiations (IGN) aimed at reforming the 15-member Council resumed on Thursday, while noting that some permanent members were behind those attempts in their bid to preserve their own privileged position.
\n\u201cThat course of action is a siren call to deadlock and a dead-end,\u201d the Pakistani envoy warned, adding that such attempts in the past led to an impasse and the breakdown of negotiations.
\n\u201cWe remain convinced that the IGN process offers the best avenue to reach an agreed outcome to the question of equitable representation and reform of the Security Council,\u201d Ambassador Akram said.
\n\u201cIt is only through patient exchanges, mutual accommodation and compromise that we can broaden the areas of convergence and reduce the points of divergence and thus evolve a \u2018model\u2019 for the reform that can be accepted by the widest possible majority of Member States, as stipulated in Decision 62\/557 of the General Assembly,\u201d he added.
\nFull-scale negotiations to reform the Security Council began in the General Assembly in February 2009 on five key areas \u2014 the categories of membership, the question of veto, regional representation, size of an enlarged Security Council, and working methods of the council and its relationship with the General Assembly.
\nProgress towards restructuring the Security Council remains blocked as G-4 countries \u2014 India, Brazil, Germany and Japan \u2014 continue pushing for permanent seats in the Council, while the Italy\/Pakistan-led Uniting for Consensus (UfC) group firmly opposes any additional permanent members.
\nAs a compromise, UfC has proposed a new category of members \u2014 not permanent members \u2014 with longer duration in terms and a possibility to get re-elected.
\nThe Security Council is currently composed of five permanent members \u2014 Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States \u2014 and 10 non-permanent members elected to two-year terms.
\nIn his remarks, Ambassador Akram said the most important change in global realities was that, in contrast to 1945 \u2014 the year the UN was established by 51 countries \u2014 today it is constituted by 193 mostly small and medium-sized States largely from Asia, Africa and Latin America.
\n\u201cAn expanded and reformed Security Council must offer equitable representation, in accordance with their numbers, to these small and medium-sized States,\u201d the Pakistani envoy said.
\nThe regional approach, espoused by the UfC and the African Group, he added, offered the best avenue to achieve this objective.
\nAs regards the issue of veto, Ambassador Akram said it has been responsible often for preventing the Security Council from taking decisive action for the maintenance of international peace and security.
\n\u201cIt is precisely for this reason that the UfC believes that a reform of the Council should not add permanent members which would add several additional States with the possibility to block and stymie its effective functioning,\u201d he said.
\nNoting various proposals put forward in this regard, the Pakistani envoy said, \u201cWe believe that the veto rights of the existing permanent members should be abolished or at least severely restricted, and that the right of veto should not be expanded. Nor should new permanent members be added to the Council, with or without veto, in particular since this would deny equitable representation to the rest of the UN membership and make it even most undemocratic and unaccountable.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
UNITED NATIONS Pakistan has called for evolving a \u201cmodel\u201d for restructuring the UN Security Council through patient exchanges, mutual accommodation and compromise acceptable to the widest possible majority of member states, saying that any other course of action would lead to a \u201cdead-end\u201d. \u201cWe remain opposed to attempts to steer member states towards solutions imposed […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":314401,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-314390","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world"},"yoast_head":"\n