India pushes for urgent and comprehensive reforms in UN Security Council

New Delhi, Sep 24: In an attack on the stalled process to expand the UN Security Council (UNSC), four aspirants for permanent membership, including India, issued a joint statement stating that for the United Nations to adapt to the contemporary world, there must be urgent and comprehensive reforms of the Security Council and the council must be reflective of the developing world.

In a joint statement issued in New York, the Foreign Ministers of India, Japan, Germany and Brazil said that the United Nations requires urgent and comprehensive reforms while emphasising that the Security Council must be reflective of the "aspirations and perspectives of the developing world" that form the majority of UN global membership.

India emphasised its concerns in a statement of 32 countries highlighting the urgency to push reforms in the UN Security Council.

While stating that the UNSC was the principal organization for international peace and security, joint signatories to the statement reaffirmed that adapting the United Nations to contemporary world realities necessarily requires urgent and comprehensive reform of the Security Council.

"We recognize that a resilient world urgently needs reformed and effective multilateralism to deliver solutions for the pressing and evolving challenges of our time, developmental challenges, poverty, climate change, pandemics, global food security, international conflicts and crises, and international terrorism," the statement reads.

According to the statement, the heads of delegations were convinced of the need to restore faith in effective multilateralism, "we stand united, as a group of pro-reform like-minded States, determined to work towards a more inclusive, responsive and participatory international governance architecture," the statement reads.

"We further recognize that lack of progress in Security Council reform has serious implications, not only for the continued relevance of global governance institutions but also for global peace and security and delivering on the purposes, principles and promises of the United Nations Charter," it added.

The head of delegations recognised that a reformed Security Council must better reflect the contemporary United Nations membership, including through enhanced representation of Small Island Developing States (SIDS), which comprise approximately 20 per cent of the United Nations' membership.

"We reaffirm our support for the representation of Africa in line with the Common African Position, as contained in the Ezulwini Consensus and the Sirte Declaration," the statement reads.

The head of delegations also felt the need for a formal negotiation process, guided by the decision-making modalities and working methods laid out in the Charter of the United Nations and in line with the rules and procedures of the General Assembly.

In a separate plurilateral meeting, China and Russia supported the aspiration of Brazil and India, besides South Africa, to play a greater role in the UN.

A meeting of five BRICS countries saw External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar in the same room as Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi. The chill, however, continued and they are not reported to have held a bilateral so far. Other Foreign Ministers present at the meeting were Franca (Brazil), Sergey Lavrov (Russia) and Naledi Pandor (South Africa).