US calls for text-based negotiations for UNSC reform, reaffirms backing for India's permanent seat

United Nations, Sep 13 (IANS) While reaffirming support for a permanent seat for India, the US is calling for text-based negotiations for reform of the UN Security Council giving an impetus to the stalled process, according to Permanent Representative Linda Thomas-Greenfield.

"The United States supports engaging in text-based negotiations on Council reform," she said on Thursday. "It's actually a big deal. It means we’re ready to work with other countries to negotiate language, prepare amendments, and ready this resolution for a vote in the General Assembly, and ultimately amend the UN Charter."

She reaffirmed the US position backing permanent Council seats for India, Japan, and Germany.

The Council reform process known as Inter-Governmental Negotiations (IGN) has been effectively blocked by a small group of countries that oppose the adoption of a negotiating text.

Without such a document to create an agenda and the basis for negotiations, the discussions have been locked in a circular pattern since they began in 2009, going back to the starting point every year.

India and several countries have been pushing for the adoption of the negotiating text and the the US adding its weight gives it added impetus.

A senior administration official, who had earlier briefed reporters, said that it was hoped that with Thomas-Greenfield’s announcement, "we will help jump-start this process in a number of ways by calling for text-based negotiations at the earliest possible opportunities".

The focus of her speech at the Council on Foreign Relations was on giving two permanent seats to Africa, the continent of 1.5 billion people spread across 55 countries and where about half the Council-mandated peacekeeping operations are located.

"It's what our African partners seek, and we believe, this is what it’s what is just," she said.

"There are currently three non-permanent seats on the Security Council allocated to African countries on a rotating basis, for two years," she said. "The problem is, these elected seats don’t enable African countries to deliver the full benefit of their knowledge and voices to the work of the Council."

African nations have demanded two permanent seats on the Council and the addition of two elected seats.

Their demand is now resonating at the UN with added intensity as it looks to the 80th anniversary of its founding next year.

The UN's structures that were created in the aftermath of World War II with some changes in 1965 do not reflect today's world where the UN has 193 members, Thomas-Greenfield said. "The world is asking big questions about the United Nations. Whether this institution is representative and legitimate. Whether it’s built to meet the challenges of the day, as well as the challenges of the future."

"And in particular, Member States are looking at the Security Council," she added.

Thomas-Greenfield said that Washington proposes giving a non-permanent seat to landlocked developing countries.

The US also backs a permanent seat for Latin America and the Caribbean, she said, but did not endorse Brazil, which has also staked a claim.

The official who briefed reporters said that the US opposes giving the new permanent members veto rights.

The group blocking the adoption of a negotiating text is the 12-member Uniting for Consensus (UfC) led by Italy and includes Pakistan which opposes the addition of permanent members.

UfC maintains that there should be a consensus before there can be negotiating text, locking the process in a Catch-22 situation because without negotiations that require a text, there can’t be a consensus.

(Arul Louis can be contacted at arul.l@ians.in and followed at @arulouis)

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