Pakistan called for "serious discussions on a compromise solution" when the deadlocked intergovernmental negotiations aimed at restructuring the UN Security Council into a more representative, efficient and transparent body resumed on Tuesday.
"We need to collectively explore a win-win solution that accommodates different views and commands consensus," Ambassador Masood Khan, Pakistan's permanent representative to the UN, told delegates from 193 countries when they met after a space of 10 months.
The Pakistani envoy regretted that the situation of the reform process remained unchanged since the last round of the intergovernmental negotiations when five groups presented their respective positions, with no individual position commanding decisive support.
"Initiatives anchored in individual national positions do not have the support of the general membership," he said in an obvious reference to the antics of the Group of Four India, Brazil, Germany and Japan who are seeking permanent seats in an enlarged Council.
"Such positions further polarise the membership and stall the negotiation process," Masood Khan said. "Attempts at artificial acceleration, through claims of majority-minority, deepens stalemate." Pakistan, along with other members of the Uniting for Consensus (UfC), oppose any additional permanent members in the expanded Security Council.
They support the Italy-Columbia proposal that would create a new category of members not permanent members with three to five years duration and a possibility to get re-elected. It envisages the Security Council's enlargement by 10 seats to make it a 25-member body. The Security Council is currently composed of five permanent members Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States and 10 non-permanent members that are elected in groups of five to two-year terms on the Council. Pakistan is currently a non-permanent member of the Council.
"Pakistan and its partners in Uniting for Consensus (UfC) Group have always advocated compromise and flexibility as a vehicle for forward movement in the reform process," the Pakistani envoy said.
"We are the only group to offer a compromise formula, which is reflected in the Italy-Colombia paper." He said Italy, which along with Pakistan, head the UfC hosted an important Ministerial Conference on Security Council reform in Rome recently that stressed the need for urgent and comprehensive reform through compromise and flexibility. "It is abundantly clear that through compromise alone can we move forward. The nature of this compromise can only be determined through by negotiations."
The Pakistani envoy backed Africa's demand for a permanent seat on the Security Council as a "special case." "Africa's just demand for permanent seats in the Security Council is made on behalf of the entire continent and is, therefore, different from those who seek a permanent seat for themselves," he said. "The difference between two positions is both qualitative and substantive." On its part, the African Union's has called for the Council to be enlarged to 26 seats, one more permanent seat than the G-4 proposal.
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