Tuesday, December 30, 2014

Mexico Calls for Expansion, Reform of UN Security Council

12/30/2014

MEXICO CITY – The Mexican government has called for “a real process of intergovernmental negotiations” to reform the UN Security Council in a way acceptable to the vast majority of member states.

As the world prepares to celebrate the 70th anniversary of the United Nations’ founding, “we are proposing the need to expand and reform the Security Council, the organ in charge of maintaining international peace and security,” the Foreign Relations Secretariat said in a statement.

Mexico does not support expanding the number of permanent UN Security Council members “since that would limit the access of other states to the council and accentuate the differences between its members even more,” the secretariat said.

The UN Security Council has five permanent members – Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States – and 10 non-permanent members from different regions of the world elected to two-year terms.

Permanent members have veto power and can block resolutions.

“Our country favors the creation of new long-term members, who would remain in the Security Council during longer periods, with the possibility of immediate re-election,” the secretariat said.

“This would allow some states to have a longer presence on the council, at the same time maintaining accountability via frequent elections,” the secretariat said.

Mexico supports wide-ranging reform that will improve representation on the Security Council, the secretariat said.

“The last time that an expansion of the Security Council was approved was in 1963, when the council was expanded from 9 to 15 members to adjust it to the number of UN member states, which was 113 back then, or more than double the 51 that founded the organization in 1945,” the secretariat said.

The United Nations currently has 193 member states.

“Mexico sees a Security Council expanded to 26 members on which six countries from Africa, five from Asia, four from the Americas and the Caribbean, three from the Western European group and other states, two from Eastern Europe and a representative of the small developing states sit,” the Foreign Relations Secretariat said.


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