Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said Saturday that the United States unequivocally supported its close ally Japan's bid to secure a permanent seat on the UN Security Council. "Japan has earned its honourable place among the nations of the world by its own effort and its own character," Rice said in a speech at Sophia University in Tokyo. "That's why the United States unambiguously supports a permanent seat for Japan on the United Nations Security Council," she said.
Japan, Brazil, Germany and India have launched a joint bid for permanent seats on the UN Security Council, arguing that the current line-up is outdated as it was founded in the wake of World War II to reward the victors.
The United States has only explicitly backed the bid of Japan, one of its most steadfast allies. In December then US ambassador to Tokyo Howard Baker said Washington would back giving Japan veto power on the Council, a privilege enjoyed only by Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States.
Japan has been seeking a greater global role, sending troops to Iraq on its first mission to a country at war since World War II.
At a joint press conference with Japanese Foreign Minister Nobutaka Machimura, Rice lauded Japan for its "commitment to democracy" in its reconstruction efforts in Iraq, Afghanistan and other conflict-hit areas.
"On the basis of this and many other examples of Japan's willingness to accept global responsibility, the United States does support a permanent seat for Japan in the UN Security Council in the context of broader UN reform," she said.
RICE CHALLENGES NORTH KOREA: Earlier, US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice urged North Korea on Saturday to return to talks on scrapping its nuclear arms and said Washington's Asian allies could do more to bring Pyongyang back to the negotiating table.
With US impatience over the talks rising, Rice used a major foreign policy speech in Tokyo to tell North Korea to make a "strategic choice" to abandon its weapons programmes.
She also urged China's leaders to pursue greater democracy and complained about Japan's ban on US beef imports.
"Let me put it plainly: North Korea should return to the six-party talks immediately, if it is serious about exploring the path forward that we and the other parties have proposed," Rice, a former academic, said in her speech to professors, students, politicians and business leaders at a university in Tokyo.
Her language was nonetheless carefully chosen and Rice refrained from repeating the "outpost of tyranny" phrase that she used earlier this year to describe North Korea. Pyongyang, stung by the label, has demanded an apology.
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