Russia takes helm of UN Security Council. What's next? Foreign pundits share their forecasts with Caliber.Az

Russia took up the monthly presidency of the UN Security Council on April 1. The Guardian notes that Russia is planning to hold several sessions in April. Moscow is expected to devote one of the UN Security Council meetings to the theme of evacuating children from the "special military operation" zone in Ukraine. There will also be a briefing on "Risks of Violating Arms and Military Equipment Export Arrangements" and two open discussions on the situation in the Middle East.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov is expected to chair the Council during several sessions. The Russian diplomatic chief is expected to arrive in New York in April. However, the matter remains unclear because of the current situation regarding the issuance of visas for the minister and his delegation to the US amid the current international situation and the crisis in US-Russian relations.

It's not difficult to figure out what kind of reaction this news provoked. The Baltic states Estonia, Lithuania, and Latvia opposed the decision. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy expressed indignation at Russia being given the leading role in the UN Security Council for a month starting from April 1. As he said in an evening video address, this news is "obviously absurd and destructive". And Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba wrote on his Twitter page, "Russia's chairmanship of the UN Security Council is a slap in the face to the international community. Russia has usurped its seat, is waging a colonial war, its leader is a war criminal wanted by the ICC for child abduction. The world cannot be a safe place with Russia in the UN Security Council."

Ukraine and members of the UN Security Council plan not to take an active part in the body in April when Russia will hold the presidency, The Guardian writes. The United States, Britain, France and their supporters in the Council are likely to express their disapproval and lower the level of representation at events held by Russia in April, the newspaper said.

The US has called on Russia to "behave professionally" as Council chairman. It notes, however, that there is no way to block Russia from the post. The Kremlin has already said it plans to exercise all its rights.

Indeed, while a war unleashed by Moscow is raging in Ukraine, many wonder how Russia can control a body designed to maintain international peace and security. There is a clear dissonance, a contradiction even in terms of simple logic. What are the thoughts that this situation gives us? Perhaps the time has come to review the rules of participation of states in the governing structures of the United Nations. But is there any realistic way of doing this? After all, we should not forget about China, one of the major members of the UN with its interests.

Foreign experts shared their thoughts on the situation with Caliber.Az.

Russian political analyst and Deutsche Welle columnist Konstantin Eggert says the debate on whether the UN structure should be changed, whether the UN Security Council should be expanded and whether the international organisation should be modernised at all, has been going on for a long time.

"It is known that, for example, countries such as India, Brazil, and recently even Türkiye, claim to become permanent members of the UN Security Council. But the problem is that the structure of the organisation established in 1945 simply does not allow anything to be done without the consent of all five powers, which have a veto right in the Security Council. These countries will not give their permission for reform.

This is why today we see a paradoxical situation in which Russia, the aggressor state, will hold the presidency of the Council this month and nothing can be done about it.

Another thing is that the countries opposing Russia will likely make regular demarches. They are likely to reduce their representation in the Council. Probably they will boycott some of the meetings. And so will probably do the allies of the collective West, who are now members of the Council. So it is hard for me to imagine that this presidency will be easy. I will be very interested to see what will happen in the meeting room when Sergei Lavrov takes his place there, who is particulary detested by many in the West.

Nevertheless, Russia will formally hold the presidency this month. And the UN will remain what it is in the short term," Eggert believes.

The director of the Ukrainian Centre for Political Research "Penta", analyst Volodymyr Fesenko, first of all, noted that the Russian presidency of the UN Security Council does not mean that Russia has control over this structure.

"Russia will be able to influence the agenda of the UN Security Council for a month, some procedural points. But Russia cannot take any unilateral decisions. The five permanent members of the Security Council (though including Russia) have veto power," he said.

According to Fesenko, in this case, it is insulting and abnormal that an aggressor country would chair the UN Security Council even for a month.

"But it is no less insulting and abnormal that Russia has a special status in the UN Security Council (as well as four other countries). This is a consequence of the long outdated decision-making system in the UN. And this is one of the obvious signs of the deep crisis that the organisation is undergoing.

The revision of the rules of state participation in the UN's governing structures is long overdue. But this is possible with the consent of all the permanent members of the UN Security Council, including Russia. It is a vicious circle. In my view, some real change in this situation is possible only in the event of a tangible defeat for Russia in the current war against Ukraine and in the event of a profound crisis in Russia. Or there will be an acute internal crisis within the UN itself that will split the organisation itself, for example, in the event of a dramatic escalation of the confrontation between the US and China. Either way, a radical reform of the UN decision-making system is needed, which would not give privileges to individual countries and would include automatic sanctions (blocking eligibility) against the aggressor country," Fesenko believes.

The director of the South Caucasus office of the Free Russia Foundation (Tbilisi), political analyst Yegor Kuroptev, thinks that all international systems will be rebuilt.

"Now the UN is just moving reflexively. Of course, in my opinion, Russia's participation and all the more so presidency of the UN is now unacceptable. But the West is hinging on institutions and bureaucracy. This is the basis, which simply cannot be broken. When you break institutions and break norms, it ends up with Russia. I agree that the UN and other international mechanisms need to be changed because Putin's Russia is a terrorist country whose president and his entourage should be court-martialed, not in the UN," the political analyst concluded.