*UNITED NATIONS: Pakistan has underscored the need for flexibility toachieve the required consensus among all United Nations’ member states toovercome the stalemate in the long-running negotiations to restructure theUN Security Council.*
“The admittedly slow pace of progress in Security Council reform is not dueto any deficiency in the process or procedures,” Ambassador Munir Akramsaid Wednesday in a resumed session of the Inter-Governmental Negotiations(IGN) aimed at making the 15-member Council more effective, representativeand accountable.
The reason, he added, was “the inflexibility in the positions of a fewindividual states which have come into these negotiations with apre-determined end goal of fulfilling their national ambitions to secure anelevated and privileged position within the Security Council, regardless ofthe principle of sovereign equality of states”, obviously referring to therelentless campaign by India, Brazil, Germany and Japan, known as G-4, forpermanent seats in an expanded Council.
Full-scale negotiations to reform the Security Council began in the GeneralAssembly in February 2009 on five key areas, the categories of membership,the question of veto, regional representation, size of an enlarged SecurityCouncil, and working methods of the council and its relationship with theGeneral Assembly.
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Progress towards restructuring the Security Council remains blocked asIndia, Brazil, Germany and Japan continue pushing for permanent seats inthe Council, while the Italy/Pakistan-led Uniting for Consensus (UfC) groupfirmly opposes any additional permanent members.
As a compromise, UfC has proposed a new category of members, not permanentmembers, with longer duration in terms and a possibility to get re-elected.
