India has rejected proposals for a third category of membership in the Security Council
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UNITED NATIONS — India has rejected proposals for a third category of membership in the Security Council that would have longer terms and be eligible for re-election and be a substitute for expanding permanent membership, calling it a ploy to delay reforms.
India’s Deputy Permanent Representative Yojna Patel on Friday said the suggestion would continue to leave the UN mired in its crisis of legitimacy for decades.
“Consideration of a third category is a red herring that is intended to delay the process further and derail the path towards reforms entirely, or deliberately seek a sub-optimal outcome that would push real reform many decades into the future to the detriment of the legitimacy, credibility and relevance of the UN”, she said at a meeting of the Intergovernmental Negotiations (IGN) for reforms that discussed categories of membership.
The proposal for the third category referred to as Fixed Regional Seats emanates mainly from a small group opposed to expanding permanent membership, which calls itself the Uniting for Consensus (UfC) group that is led by Italy, with Pakistan as a member.
The group proposed the category as a substitute for expanding the permanent membership category, which it opposes.
The UfC has also consistently blocked progress in the negotiation by using procedural manoeuvres to prevent the adoption of negotiating text essential for making progress.
In a dig at the group, Patel said, “Barring a few member states with vested interests, the wider membership agrees that the time for reforming the Security Council was yesterday.”
Japan’s Permanent Representative Yamazaki Kazuyuki, who spoke on behalf of the Group of 4 that includes India, pointed out that “The proposed [category of] seats are essentially not any different from the current non-permanent seats.”
Since continuity of membership is not assured for this proposed category, “it cannot be a substitute for permanent seats and does not constitute a sufficient solution to the structural imbalances currently existing within the Council”, he said.
The G4, which also includes Germany and Brazil, advocates jointly for a reform that includes expanding the permanent membership, and its members mutually support each other for permanent seats.
“The G4 reiterates that this proposal disregards the majority of voices supporting the expansion in both the permanent and non-permanent categories”, Yamazaki said.
Another pro-reform group to which India also belongs, the L.69, also came out against the third category proposal.
Saint Lucia’s Permanent Representative Menissa Rambally, who spoke on behalf of the L.69 group said it “views with concern” any intermediate or hybrid proposal that substitutes expansion of the two categories.
It would not be a real reform of the Council, she said, and added, “The Global South did not wait 80 years only to accept hybrid formulas as a consolation or the appearance of reform”.
The L.69 is a group of 42 developing countries from across the world that pursues Council reform, and it gets the name from a document that helped start the IGN process.
Patel dismissed another suggestion to give the Fixed Regional Seat-holders vetoes.
“A veto cannot be granted to a group with no clarity on which country will exercise it and in what manner”, she said.
“This new idea seems to be deliberately intended to complicate an already difficult discussion and indirectly entrench opposition to expansion of the permanent category”, she said.
Patel said that expanding just the permanent and non-permanent categories “is central to achieving meaningful reforms” and it has the backing of the majority of UN members.
“Any reform that does not result in the expansion of the permanent category would be incomplete, unjust and ignorant of the aspirations of an overwhelming number of member states, particularly various reform-centric groups”, she said.
Dismissing criticism that expanding permanent membership will complicate the working of the Council, Patel said, "The working methods and practices of the Security Council could be reviewed and reformulated in order to meet the requirements of a reformed Council, with increased presence of more member states in both categories”.
The non-representation or under-representation of the Asia-Pacific, Africa and Latin America-Caribbean group in the permanent category is central to any Council reform, she said.