Sam Kutesa may bring in paper to reform UN Security Council

NEW DELHI: In what would be a shot in arm for the Modi government, outgoing UN General Assembly (UNGA) President Sam Kutesa is likely to formally introduce a negotiating document this week for Security Council reforms, including new entrants as permanent members, for the 69th session of UNGA that ends next week.

If the document is adopted it would be the first step for meaningful negotiations on expanding UN Security Council (UNSC). However, China in a last ditch attempt is trying to block the negotiating text to deny an expanded UNSC, officials said from New York. India, along with Japan, Germany, Brazil and a country from Africa are claimants for a permanent seat in UNSC.

The ongoing initiative was launched in 2000. Kutesa revived it and circulated the draft document to the 193 UN members this July. The document can be adopted by a simple majority in UNGA.

The process is known as the Inter-Governmental Negotiations on Security Council Reforms. According to Kutesa UNSC reform is a “priority” and is “critical” to enable the “organisation to meet the world’s increasingly complex global challenges”. Jamaican Ambassador Courtenay Rattray is the head of IGN and leading the negotiations. India’s UN Permanent Representative Asoke Kumar Mukerji, pushing India’s case, has time and again pointed to the UNSC’s inability to deal with conflicts globally.

“We need to urgently broaden the Council to make it more representative, more effective and more democratic, reflecting the diversity of our UN,” he once said. The 25-page document drafted on the basis of the survey conducted by Rattray lists different proposals that include new permanent members or not, different modalities for veto powers of new powers and regional distribution of seats.

Future negotiations would create draft resolution on the UN reforms. While 116 countries responded to the survey, support of 97 countries needed for its adoption was assured.