1. The goal of reforming the Security Council is to arrive at a restructured and modernized Council, both in form and content, prepared to address the imperatives of the twenty-first century.
2. The present composition of the Security Council places full control of the Council's actions and decisions on the permanent five with little balance or influence in favour of the non-permanent members. Decision-making is thus very much the prerogative of the permanent five. A strong feature of the Council's performance over recent years is the near total ability of permanent members, individually or in concert, to determine decision-making. The veto is seldom used openly but the threat of its use is a permanent feature in arriving at decisions. Without criticizing the non-permanent members, it can be concluded that non-permanent members do not really make a difference on the big issues. The effect of this is that the permanent five determine what, when and where international peace and security are at stake.
3. The Security Council is facing sea changes internationally, including developments that are related to changes in the global power equation. Multilateral systems, especially the United Nations, need to manifest democratization in the decision-making processes and this is in need of reform to restore effectiveness, credibility and legitimacy.
4. The relationship between the security Council and the general membership must be redefined. Article 24, which empowers the Council to act on behalf of the general membership, is not a carte blanche. While the article is silent, it is clear that the general membership embodied in the General Assembly retains residual powers and that actions of the Council are not to be without oversight of the Assembly.
5. Ultimately to achieve democratization in the international system, all the nature and combination of permanent membership and aspects of decision-making, including the role of the veto, would have to be re-examined. Accountability to the general membership must be factored in without cutting into the authority of the Council. Even if countries are permanent members, the General Assembly ought to exercise oversight on their performance as well as the universal values they are expected to uphold.
II. CONCEPT OF PERMANENT REGIONAL REPRESENTATION
6. Permanent regional representation is a form of representation in the Security Council where a number of members represent a specific geographical region. Essentially the proposal seeks to address the need for an equitable and balanced geographical representation.
7. In political and economic context, Asia, Africa and Latin America and the Caribbean are regions of developing countries. These three regions require permanent representation. It is also conceivable that the industrialized countries are an identifiable region. Japan and Germany are in that group.
8. It is proposed that each developing region be allocated two seats. Each seat will clearly represent countries of the region and not purely that of a country.
9. A regional mechanism will decide on how the seats are to be allocated. The right of any country in a region to serve in the permanent seat is always maintained. In practice selection will take into account important factors such as contribution to United Nations efforts, such as peace-keeping, upholding universal values, including human rights, size, population, global involvement and capacity to pay. Regional permanent members together with other members in the region will share the financial costs of regional representation in the Security Council.
10. The representatives will continue to represent the region until other countries in the region are chosen in replacement.
11. Permanent regional members shall exercise all rights similar to other permanent members.
12. All members must fulfill the criteria for membership consistent with the relevant provisions of the Charter.
13. Given the objective of democratization and taking into account the veto of the five, the introduction of the idea of regional permanent membership does not amount to discrimination.
III OTHER CONSIDERATIONS
14. Current permanent members only represent themselves and not anyone else. The system devised 50 years ago vis a vis the five countries as permanent members cannot be changed, without their consent, which is not likely in any that this situation cannot be re-examined. This does not also preclude the representation. The Charter makes no reference to regional representation but the concept of regionalism was recognized even in 1945 as reflected in the appreciation shown for regional organizations in Chapter VIII of the Charter. Its implicit recognition is reflected in the regional process preceding elections for the Security Council. One has to recognize developments towards identifiable growth poles revolving around regions - stability of States are linked to stability of regions; stability and cooperative efforts within regions reinforce stability of States and eliminate problems of asymmetry and hegemonic tendencies that act against regionalism and enhance competitive nationalism and the competitive concept of national security that had long dogged regions. Regionalism has developed as it has proved to serve the interest of all, the big, the small, the weak and the strong.
15. Permanent regional representation seeks to remove the claim that countries can have permanent rights to the Security Council without accountability to others and the regions they belong to. Permanent regional representation will underline the increasing untenability of permanent members who are neither selected by regions nor the general membership and, worse, non-accountable.
16. The Security Council is not an arena for developed and developing countries as such, but it cannot be denied that issues in the Council dealing with international peace and security are either virtually those related to areas in developing countries or, if not, are always given determination by way of the political proclivities of countries in terms of developed and developing.
IV. SIZE OF A REFORMED COUNCIL
17. The African paper proposes 25, while the Movement of Non-Aligned Countries proposed no less than 11 non-permanent seats, if agreement on permanent seats was not possible.
18. It is important to emphasize that each developing region be given two seats to balance a Council that will be overloaded with industrialized countries if Japan and Germany are admitted. With 8 new permanent members and 5 existing and 10 existing non-permanent, it would alone total 23; and there should be 7 new non-permanent making a total of 30 members.
19. Thirty members out of 185 countries is not large. The Council can act effectively with 30 members.
V. VETO
20. Genuine reform in the Security Council must include reform of the veto. The veto is obsolete and politically untenable in an increasing number of cases, but as it cannot be removed because the present permanent five will not relinquish the veto, the reformed veto must be seen to be increasingly a unique act of concerted action under extraordinary circumstances and not as it is now, the prerogative of five countries.
21. There is a universal clamour to reform the veto, even if it cannot be eliminated.
