India's bid for UNSC seat reaches crucial stage

Asoke Mukerji, India’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations, was the first to climb up to the rostrum as soon as the 69th session of the United Nations General Assembly came to an end on September 14. He reached behind the famous marble desk and greeted Sam Kutesa, who just concluded his one-year tenure as the President of the General Assembly. They shared a brief but hearty laugh.

Mukerji had reasons to be happy, and grateful to Kutesa. The former Ugandan foreign minister, who took over as president of the UNGA a year ago, played a key role in keeping alive New Delhi’s hope, if not adding a momentum to its pursuit, for a permanent seat for India in the all-powerful United Nations Security Council. Just before its 69th session concluded, the UNGA adopted without voting a text, which set the stage for negotiations on the long-pending issue of UNSC reform during its 70th session. Kutesa himself presented the text before the UNGA, notwithstanding pressure from big powers like United States, China and Russia, which sought to block the initiative to move to text-based negotiation on UNSC expansion.

The adoption of the text by the General Assembly does not, of course, mean that the Security Council’s expansion is now just days away. Yet, it is significant for India and all other nations seeking a permanent seat around the Horseshoe Table. Though discussions in case of all other processes at the UN result in documents that serve as the basis for further negotiations, expansion of the Security Council has been the only issue that has been discussed at the General Assembly for years without any negotiating text.

“We have only been making statements in the air, or at each other, with easily deniable or disputable summaries, or at times compilation texts, to register our endeavours,” said Mukerji, who termed it as “the most positive and unique development”. This is the first time in the history of the inter-governmental negotiation on the UNSC reform that a decision has been adopted through an official formal document of the UNGA. It not only turned the negotiations into an irreversible process based on a text, but also saved the works done in the 69th session  of the General Assembly and carried it forward to the 70th session that commenced the next day.

What is more significant is that the decision of the General Assembly formally recognised Kutesa’s July 31, 2015, letter to the envoys of all UN member nations. The letter, along with its annexure, in fact, reflects the proposals and positions articulated by the member countries during negotiations on Security Council reform over the past years.

This is going to form the substance of the text for negotiations during the 70th session of the General Assembly. It compiles the views of the member nations on a range of issues related to UNSC reform –categories of membership, veto, regional representation, size of enlarged council, its working methods and its relationship with the UNGA.

But make no mistake. If the adoption of the text for negotiation by the General Assembly on September 14 was a path-breaking development, the path ahead still remains long and bumpy.

The text itself contains conflicting views of the member nations on all the issues and resolving them is likely to take years. What can make the negotiations more complicated, and can even derail or halt the process, is the resistance by the “Big Three” among the five permanent members of the Security Council.

Progress in negotiations

Both the United States and Russia stand with China when it comes to opposing any substantive progress in the negotiations. This became clear when all the three Big Powers’ Permanent Representatives to the United Nations responded almost identically – albeit in different words and cloaked in diplomatese – to a March 26 call by Jamaica’s envoy to the international organisation, Courtenay Rattray, chair of the inter-governmental negotiation on UNSC reform, to give inputs to what would eventually turn into the negotiating text. This was reflected once again in the statements in the UNGA plenary session, which finally adopted the text.

China’s delegate argued that the framework document had “cut into pieces” the integrity of the membership (of the UNGA). Russia maintained that the negotiating text could only be drafted by the member states and not by the coordinator or GA president. “Imposing a text that did not reflect the entire membership risked reversing the process. 
Negotiations should be conducted in an inclusive manner without artificial timelines,” said Moscow’s delegate to the UN.

Speaking for Uniting for Consensus, a bloc comprising Pakistan and other nations opposing claims of India and its G4 partners (Brazil, Germany and Japan) for a permanent Security Council seat, Italy’s delegate complained that the Member States had not been given enough opportunity to express reservations on the text.

The US envoy to the UN, Samantha Power, earlier wrote to GA President that any consideration of an expansion of permanent members must take into account the ability and willingness of countries to contribute to the maintenance of international peace and security and to the other purposes of the international organisation.

Yet, it is no mean feat for the diplomats of India and other G-4 nations that the text has been adopted by the GA without any vote, notwithstanding such stiff resistance.
It is now clear to New Delhi that support of the US and Russia for India’s claim for a permanent Security Council seat, albeit articulated at the highest level by President Barack Obama and President Vladimir Putin, do not in fact have any practical value. India will now have to hold the G-4 together and keep on working in tandem with the L-69 (a bloc comprising developing nations of Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean, Asia and Pacific) to tread the path ahead, without relying much on supports from Big Powers.