US backs G-4 for permanent seat at UNSC ‘to reflect today’s realities’
Backing India’s stand that the United Nations Security Council of 70 years ago does not reflect the realities of today, a top US diplomat has said that the Biden administration supports G-4 members becoming permanent members of the UN’s top body.
US ambassador to the UN, Linda Thomas-Greenfield, at a speech in Tokyo, where she is travelling, indicated that Russia and China are the only two countries in the Security Council who are opposed to the expansion of the 15-member powerful wing of the UN.
“Previously the US, China and Russia agreed on one thing and that was that we did not want to see changes in the Security Council. But in 2021, the US pulled out of that and we’ve made clear that we must see reform in the Security Council and broadly in the UN,” she
India has been at the forefront of years-long eorts to reform the Security Council, saying it rightly deserves a place as a permanent member at the UN said. “The Security Council of 70 years ago does not reflect the realities of today, where we have 193 (member States), where Africa does not have a permanent seat, Latin America does not have a permanent seat and other countries around the world and other regions are not represented in a significant way in the Council,” she said.
“So one, we have made clear in our discussions with some of the members of the so-called G4 - Japan, Germany and India (and Brazil) - we support their becoming permanent members of the Security Council,” she said. “And the President reinforced this in his speech last year, again rearming our support for permanent seats for Africa and Latin America and additional elected seats on the Council.
“Over the past year, I have had a series of listening tours among regional groupings to get their ideas on how we might move this agenda forward. We are continuing to work on that,” Thomas-Greenfield said.
India has been at the forefront of years-long eorts to reform the Security Council, saying it rightly deserves a place as a permanent member at the UN high table, which in its current form does not represent the geo-political realities of the 21st Century.