In 2022, the then president of the United States, Joe Bidenreiterated his disposition to Expand the number of countries that sit in the United Nations Security Councilthe top decision of the UN, responsible for issuing obligated compliance for Member States, authorizing military interventions or launching peace missions. Biden even gave name and surnames to possible candidates. Supported the aspirations to the Council of Germany, India y Japan. And defended the need for Latin America y Africa They were represented in that new “Expanded Council”.
The Security Council now has five permanent members and with Veto right (United States, Russia, China, United Kingdom and France) and another 10 non -permanent seats, which rotate and have a two -year mandate.
Washington then supported the number of permanent members, although without giving them veto right, and it was also prone to increase the number of non -permanent seats. That has remained nothing. The new Trump administration wants to weaken the UN, not to strengthen it, much less reform it.
Reform or die
The United Nations System, created by the winning countries of the World War II in 1945is formed by the aforementioned Security Council; By the General Assembly, which is in essence a forum for debate and political dialogue, scenario these days of the speeches of world leaders; by the International Court of Justicethe World Court that now examines for example if Israel commits a genocide in Gaza; and for the different humanitarian organizationssuch as childhood (UNICEF), the fight against hunger (the World Food Program), that of refugees (UNHCR) or that of culture (UNESCO), among others.
But the UN, octogenarian, suffers death tremors because Multilateralism It is increasingly questioned. The world for which the organization was created no longer exists. The advice is limited to exonerating the friends of countries with veto. He did it Russiaavoiding during a decade the sanctions to the Syria of the dictator Bashar al Assad While he massacred his people. He does it now USAwho has vetoed six resolutions to demand Israel a high fire that stops the massacre in Gaza.
UN Secretary General, Anónio Guterres, in his opening speech of the General Assembly on Tuesday. / LEV RADIN / EFE
The administration of Donald Trump He has retired his financing to the bulk of the agencies, which as the greatest taxpayer has meant a huge varapalo. And, meanwhile, encourage the Unilateralism and the Exceptionalism American, political and diplomatically dynamite all initiatives within them. Trump himself has dedicated part of his speech in the 80 general assembly of this week to attack the UN hard for supporting migrations and fighting climate change. The good news is that it has not retired financing to the organization, as many feared, and that after their meeting with the Secretary General António Guterres He has assured that he is “100%” with the UN.
In this context, now it seems unthinkable the reform of the maximum world security body to try to stop credibility bleeding.
More permanent members
There is a certain consensus on the need to add permanent members to the Security Council. The number of chairs at the round table of the high institution in a 1965 reform was already increased. Then it went from having 11 members to the current 15. Why not increase the total to 20 or 25, to make it more representative?
Among the main candidates is Indiathe most populated country, which represents one in six human beings. Nueva Delhi wants a position like the great ones, with the right of veto, something almost unthinkable. Besides, Pakistan He is suspicious that his historical enemy, with which he has held a low intensity war this year, assumes that enormous power in the global scene.
Something similar happens with Africa. The continent is the great excluded from the New York Decision Center, despite being the region whose population grows faster and has more than 1.4 billion inhabitants, 15% of the world total and more than fifty independent states. Nigeria He is one of the candidates in everyone’s mind. But Egypt o Ethiopia They have no interest in representing their continent, explains the expert Suzanne Nossel in the magazine ‘Foreign Policy’. TO Italiafor his part, he would not like it to be Germany the European country that amounted to the Olympus of the Council. Argentina y Mexico They oppose, on the other hand, the ambitions of Brazil.
There are objective proposals on the table, such as including two new countries in each region, which has more population and the one that accumulates more GDP. “From Asia-Pacific, this formula would give seats to India by population already Japan by GDP. From Africa, Nigeria y South Africa They would become members. Brazil and Mexico would be the ones who enter the Latin American and Caribbean group, “writes Nossel.” Poland and Ukraine would be incorporated from Eastern Europe, while Germany and, depending on the moment, Italia or Canada would rise from the Western European group and others. If the group of 10 members of the Council chosen in the short term was intact, the new proposal could lead to a council with a total size of between 20 and 24 members: a figure within the range of other proposals that have been discussed for some time. “
The position of Spain
Last year, the United Nations celebrated the call “Summit of the future”. The objective was to pergeate common strategies to reinforce the United Nations capacity and, with it, international governance and trust in multilateralism.
Over there, Space He defended the reform. Spain wants more geographical representation, but no more veto right, as explained to this newspaper a diplomatic source with direct knowledge of the work documents of the Foreign Ministry. “Faced with other initiatives that ask that there are more countries with veto, we with others oppose, and we believe that it makes more sense to go to a ‘no-veto’, Or towards being blurred, “reasons the same source.
The UN Security Council /Europe Press/Contact/Lev Radin
In that direction of mitigating the power of the veto was the reform of April 26, 2022. If any of the five permanent members of the Security Council vetoed a resolution supported by the rest, the General Assembly could convene an emergency meeting in which the Discolo Member of the Council had to appear to explain its rejection of the majority. It is what happened, for example, after the United States veto in April 2024 of the resolution in favor of the entry of Palestine as a full member of the UN, approved by the Assembly a few days before.
To be approved, a proposal to reform the Security Council must obtain support from two thirds of the Member States of the UN General Assembly (128 of the current 193) and of the five current permanent members of the Council. A complicated agreement in view of Trumpist contempt for the organization or current shock of Russia with France and the United Kingdom or China and the United States.
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