African Union demands U.N. Security Council seats

Jul 14, 2005, 17:14 GMT

New York - The African Union on Thursday demanded that its continent be given two permanent seats and five short-term seats in an enlarged U.N. Security Council.

The A.U., comprising 53 countries, presented a draft resolution to the U.N. General Assembly calling for reforming the current Security Council by adding 11 new members to the council's current 15.

Under the A.U. plan, a 26-member council would have six new permanent members with veto power in addition to five permanent members: the United States, Russia, China, France and Britain.

The plan calls for increasing the number of countries elected on short terms to 15. Currently there are 10 elected for two-year terms.

The A.U. draft resolution was hammered out at its summit last week in the coastal Libyan city of Sirte. The A.U. released details last week on its proposal.

A competing proposal for Security Council reform has dominated discussion at the General Assembly this week. The G4 - Germany, Japan, India and Brazil - want to expand the council to 25 members, with six new permanent members who initially would not have veto power. The four countries want permanent seats.

The G4 proposal also calls for adding four new short-term members, which would make a total of 14 short-term members.

The United States is opposed to embarking on reform of the council at this time, preferring instead that the U.N. concentrates on overhauling its management and bureaucracy, and strengthening peacekeeping and human rights operations.

A third group, Uniting for Consensus, led by Pakistan, Italy and China, opposes the creation of new permanent members. It has called for an enlarged council with the addition of only short-term members. Any change would need two-thirds approval by the General Assembly.

This week's debate marks the most concrete steps taken after more than a decade of negotiations aimed at reforming and making the council a more democratic body.

U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan is hoping that discussions will have moved far enough along by September so that the annual General Assembly session - marking the 60th anniversary of the United Nations - will be able to adopt a reform package.