New Delhi: India's former ambassador to the United States, Meera Shankar says there is an urgent need to reform United Nations to ensure the world body is more effective and representative of contemporary realities.
"The world today faces multiple crises and ongoing conflicts. The UN, which reflects the world as it emerged after the Second World War, has proved inadequate for meeting these challenges. There is an urgent need for reform of the UN to make it both more representative of contemporary realities and more effective. Such reforms would have to include the Security Council," Shankar said in an exclusive interview to ETV Bharat on Monday.
Her comments echo ones reflected during the recent Quad summit in United States attended by Prime Minister Narendra Modi along with the leaders of Japan and Australia. Following the summit, the Quad leaders called for urgent reforms to the UNSC to make it more representative and accountable, and also called for its expansion to include representation from more countries.
After the summit, the Quad leaders called for expanded permanent membership to include representation from Africa, Asia, Latin America, and the Caribbean.
“We will reform the UN Security Council, recognizing the urgent need to make it more representative, inclusive, transparent, efficient, effective, democratic and accountable through expansion in permanent and non-permanent categories of membership of the UN Security Council,” the Quad leaders joint statement read.
The US also supported the call for India's bid for permanent membership in the UNSC. According to the joint fact sheet, released by the white house after the meeting, President Biden shared with Prime Minister Modi that the United States supports initiatives to reform global institutions to reflect India’s important voice, including permanent membership for India in a reformed UN Security Council.
On Maritime Domain Awareness Programme
Hailing the Quad leaders decision to extend the Maritime Domain Awareness Programme to the Indian Ocean, the ex ambassador to the US stated, "This is significant given China’s naval forays into the Indian Ocean. There will also be training and capability building for countries of the region to better benefit from the information provided".
It is pertinent to note that India will host the inaugural symposium of the new regional maritime initiative for Training in the Indo-Pacific (MAITRI), to train Quad partners to monitor and secure their waters, enforce their laws, and deter unlawful behaviour.
'Pact For The Future' on UNSC reforms
Indicating how even United Nations has also realised the need for major reforms, a UN summit document for the first time contained a detailed paragraph on Security Council reform as world leaders adopted 'Pact for the Future' on September 22.
India called it a good beginning and said it was looking forward eventually to the beginning of text-based negotiations in a fixed time frame to reform the 15-nation body. UN officials described the language in the 'Pact of the Future' on the long-pending Security Council reforms as groundbreaking.
"I would only point you in the direction of the fact that for the first time, a UN summit document has a detailed paragraph on UN Security Council reform," said Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri in response to a question on how India sees this language on UNSC reform in the 'Pact of the Future'.
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