US-UNSC: Attempt to shift power balance Expert opinions on Caliber.Az

The US intends to invite six new permanent members to the United Nations Security Council (UNSC), The Washington Post (WP) writes, citing officials from the administration of President Joe Biden.

According to the newspaper's interlocutors, the White House is preparing a plan to reconstruct the most influential UN body. Linda Thomas-Greenfield, the US president's representative at the organisation, is negotiating with diplomats from 193 countries about the potential expansion of the Security Council. The new members of the body will not be given veto power.

"Any reform of the Security Council may well reduce the weight of the West. So, it's a reality," a UN diplomat explained in a conversation with WP.

Nevertheless, Washington hopes to expand the influence of developing countries in the international organisation and "restore confidence" in the UN Security Council. The US faces problems in building consensus in an increasingly divided world, so Biden is pushing for reform. In particular, the US president spoke about expanding the Security Council last September at the 77th session of the General Assembly.

"The time has come for the UN to become a more inclusive organisation that responds more effectively to the needs of the modern world," Biden said at the time.

He also called on the other permanent members of the Security Council to limit the use of its veto power to "rare, emergency situations."

The White House has pushed for the UN Security Council to remain the world's primary tool for preventing war, despite doubts about its ability to deter military action, WP wrote.

Proposals to reform the Security Council became more frequent in the public arena after the Ukraine war outbreak. For example, Kyiv called for excluding Russia from the UN Security Council. Ukrainian officials, including President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, noted that Russia is an ineligible member of the body, as it illegitimately took the place of the Soviet Union after its collapse.

Leading developing countries, including Brazil and India, also insist on Security Council reform. According to the authorities of these states, the interests of the "Big South" countries are underrepresented in the Security Council.

"For me, council reform is the key to making the Global South feel that it has a significant stake in preserving the system," Brazilian Ambassador to the UN Ronaldo Costa Filho said.

Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev also stressed the need to reform the UN Security Council and offered his version.

"In the current circumstances, not only we, many countries say and insist that serious reforms are needed, especially the composition of the UN Security Council should be reviewed. I am also a supporter of this idea," Aliyev said in an interview with Azerbaijani TV channels.

The Azerbaijani leader believes that a Muslim country should become a new permanent member of the UN Security Council. It should be determined by the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) on a rotating basis. According to Aliyev, the country chairing the Non-Aligned Movement should also be permanently represented in the UN Security Council.

The Biden administration has not yet put forward a concrete reform proposal, although Washington had previously signalled that it would support Germany, Japan, and India as permanent Security Council members. Meanwhile, France and Britain are in favour of permanent seats for Germany, Japan and India, as well as Brazil and at least one African country.

Caliber.Az asked foreign experts to share their views on the possible reforms of the UN Security Council.

Director of the Kyiv-based Institute for World Politics Yevgen Magda began by noting that the idea of reforming the UN is not really new.

"And the fact that the United States is proposing some new algorithm today is evidence that the problem does exist. But they have been talking about this issue since the early 1990s when the Soviet Union collapsed. The fact is that the UN system itself is not effective at the moment. This is on the one hand.

On the other hand, the United Nations Security Council actually has the rule of collusion, which is used at least by Russia and China. And it is quite difficult to move this situation or change it in any way. So, we have to understand that the United States' initiative will be long-lasting, and it is obviously aimed at trying to change the balance of power in the UNSC.

But based on China's influence in Africa and the fact that Russia also has enough mechanisms of influence (including financial) on the states that we call "Third World countries," it is difficult to say that the UN reform will be simple.

I would say that the key to UN reform is Russia's defeat in the war against Ukraine. In this case, there will be a qualitatively different picture of international relations, and it will seriously change the situation in global international institutions", the director of the Institute said.

As Head of the Centre for Post-Industrial Society Research, Russian political scientist Vladislav Inozemtsev noted in turn, this is indeed a very important and interesting topic, but so far it is useless.

"The US cannot ‘invite’ anyone to become a permanent member of the Security Council, because Russia will use its veto power [and, most likely, neither will China]. Excluding Russia from permanent membership in the Security Council is also impossible because that would render illegitimate hundreds of UN decisions made since 1992 when it actually voted in the organisation for certain decisions.

In my opinion, and I have written about it many times [e.g. here], to reform the UN it is necessary to expel Russia from the organisation itself for violating the UN Charter [the mechanism is described in detail in the attached article, while the precedent of expelling a permanent member from the UN took place in 1971 when Taiwan was expelled from the organisation].

This, however, requires China's consent, and therefore the West needs a serious rethinking of its geopolitical approaches," Inozemtsev summarised.