Global Policy Forum

By Evelyn Leopold

Like the weather, everyone talks about reforming the U.N. Security Council but no one seems able to change it. This year's U.N. summit was no different. The closest the United Nations came to expanding the 15-member council was considering a plan by Germany, Japan, India and Brazil last spring. But the moment came and went without a vote.

National rivalries across and within each regional group run high, although the prime ministers and presidents at the summit pledged to do something by the end of the year. "What we see at the U.N. today is an orgy of posturing on Security Council reform, most countries having adopted a fairly self-interested position on the subject," said David Malone, a former Canadian U.N. ambassador. Leaders from the four candidates, known as the Group of Four or G-4, met in New York last week and decided to put their resolution back on the table. But participants at the session said there was no strategy of how or when to do this. "Reform is always a challenge, as it requires us to confront the status quo. But that is no justification for inaction," said Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi. But Italy's Foreign minsiter Gianfranco Fini, who opposes the G-4 plan, told the U.N. General Assembly on Sunday that the Security Council could not be reformed through "artificial" deadlines "aimed at creating new positions of privilege." Secretary-General Kofi Annan, after a decade of debate, urged U.N. members in March to come to a decision world leaders could endorse, arguing that the council, which decides on war and peace, sanctions and peacekeeping, still reflected the balance of power at the end of World War Two.

Months of divisive debate ensued in the U.N. General Assembly earlier this year. But the 35-page document world leaders endorsed on U.N. reforms had only one sentence on the need for the 15-member council to become "more broadly representative, more efficient and transparent." On this issue, compromise was nearly impossible as council seats meant winners and losers, with each candidate having drawn enough opposition to prevent a resolution from gaining a two-thirds vote in the 191-member General Assembly. The council currently has 10 nonpermanent seats, rotating for two-year terms, and five permanent members with veto power -- the United States, Russia, Britain, China and France, considered World War Two victors. To begin council expansion, the 191-member General Assembly must approve a framework, without names of candidates, by a two-thirds vote, with each member casting one vote. The last step in the process is a U.N. Charter change, which must be approved by national legislatures, and here the current five permanent members have veto power.

The United States says it would go for "two or so" more permanent members for a total of five or six additional seats, but argued for a delay, as did China, which opposes Japan. Britain and France support the four aspirants. Brazil, Germany, India and Japan, whose plan also called for two permanent seats from Africa, had hoped for a deal with the 53-member African Union, which has a similar proposal. But the Africans insisted new permanent members have veto power, which the four aspirants dropped because of opposition from the current five council powers. "It's up to the African countries and the G-4 to talk to each other," French Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin said. "What we hope is that an agreement will be achieved by the end of the year." Another group of about 20 countries, including Italy, Canada, Pakistan and Mexico, known as "Uniting for Consensus", has also proposed expanding the council to 25 members. But it wants 10 new rotating nonpermanent seats. Asked if council reform was dead for in the foreseeable future, Pakistan's U.N. ambassador Munir Akram said: "It's on life support."

FAIR USE NOTICE: This page contains copyrighted material the use of which has not been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. Global Policy Forum distributes this material without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. We believe this constitutes a fair use of any such copyrighted material as provided for in 17 U.S.C íŸ 107. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond fair use, you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.