January 14, 2000
Japan failed Friday to convince China to support its bid to become a permanent member of the U.N. Security Council or its alternative plan to reduce its heavy share of financial contributions to the United Nations if Japan is not made a permanent member, a Japanese official said.
China "showed no change in its position expressing its understanding of Japan's wishes," but stopping short of offering its support, the official said in briefing reporters about a one-day meeting on U.N. issues between Japanese and Chinese senior officials in Tokyo.
The Japanese team was led by Kiyotaka Akasaka, deputy director general of the Foreign Ministry's Multilateral Cooperation Department, while the Chinese delegation was headed by Zhang Jun, a senior official of the Chinese Foreign Ministry's Department of International Organizations and Conferences.
The official said Japan stressed how "increasingly difficult it is to gain sufficient public support for payment of its heavy 20 per cent share of U.N. contributions when Japan's bid to become a permanent member remains long unrealised." "The Chinese side acknowledged Japan's share is too heavy," the official said. But it blamed the United States for causing such a problem by leaving arrears and imposing a ceiling of 25 per cent on its contributions to the New York-based world body.
Japan accounts for the second highest share behind the U.S., and pays far more than the four other permanent Security Council members - Britain, China, France and Russia. The U.S.'s 25 per cent share is lower than its 26 per cent share of global gross national product (GNP), while Japan's 20 per cent share exceeds its 17 per cent share of world economic output.
China accounts for a 0.995 per cent share of total U.N. contributions, which is lower than its 3.1 per cent share of global GNP. The bilateral consultations were the fourth of their kind held since 1996 under an agreement to cooperate in seeking U.N. reforms. dpa ck js
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