OPEN-ENDED WORKING GROUP ON THE QUESTION OF EQUITABLE REPRESENTATION ON AND INCREASE IN THE MEMBERSHIP OF SECURITY COUNCIL AND OTHER MATTERS RELATED TO THE SECURITY COUNCIL
Statement delivered by Mr Bassim Blasey, Counsellor Australian Mission to the United Nations
March 11, 2002
Mr President
As we look towards ten years of discussing reform of the Security Council, all of us who support reform have to admit to being disappointed with the progress made thus far.
The lack of progress is not because the issue is unimportant. On the contrary, the Millennium Summit amply demonstrated that member states regard Security Council reform as an important part of the overall UN reform agenda. As the Council makes increasingly complex and far-reaching decisions, the need for reform will only grow. More than ever, we need a Security Council that reflects today's realities, not those of the aftermath of the Second World War.
Australia's views on what this would require in respect of membership, working methods and the veto are on the record so I will not take the time of the Working Group restating them now. There are, of course, many other views on what is needed to reform the Council. This is to be expected. We need, however, to find ways to bridge differences, find common ground and make progress.
Mr President
In this ninth year of the Working Group, it is perhaps time to step back from the details of the possible changes to the Security Council and its methods and reflect on the processes needed to achieve more rapid progress. We acknowledge the efforts of your predecessor, Mr Holkeri in this regard, in particular his willingness to canvas widely the views of Member States and to distill the main elements of the responses. His comments at the conclusion of UNGA55 provide us with some useful pointers on how we might proceed.
We agree with Mr Holkeri on the need to sustain impetus and avoid a stalemate. This requires Member States to engage more actively in the process so as to move from restatement of positions to genuine negotiation. Member states which aspire to Permanent Membership of the Council have a particular role to play in this regard. We agree too, that at an appropriate point it may be necessary to move the discussions to a higher political level. And we accept that reform must be comprehensive: it should cover all the aspects under consideration, including the veto. We should, at the same time, not reject faster progress on some aspects of reform, understanding, however, that progress on one cluster of issues should not be seen as a substitute for progress on the overall package of reforms.
Mr President
In Australia's view, it is important that we see Security Council reform as part of the broader reform of the United Nations. All our reform efforts should be mutually reinforcing. In this regard I should like to highlight the importance of reform of the regional groups. This is long overdue and needs to be looked at seriously. To any reasonable observer the current regional groupings appear outmoded and no longer reflect the reality of regional co-operation in the 21st century. This is particularly the case in the increasingly artificial distinction between West and East Europe, and in the fact that the numbers of member states from the Asia-Pacific and Africa have increased markedly since the 1950s and 1960s.
There are already problems of disparity in the size of membership of the existing groups, ranging from just over 20 members to two groups with over 50 members. Moreover, the lack of a voice for nations of the South Pacific has been conspicuous in recent years, even though this has been an area with a number of situations of conflict and political stress, some of which have been addressed by the Council. This anachronistic electoral structure for Council membership will vary even more from contemporary reality within a couple of years when enlargement of the EU and NATO will make the electoral distinction between Western and Eastern Europe less sustainable.
Mr President
This is of course a problem that is much broader than Council membership. It applies in particular to the work of the General Assembly. Establishing a better structure of regional groups will therefore need to be conducted in parallel with reform efforts outside this Working Group. At the same time, there is no doubt that establishing more rational, equitable regional group arrangements would assist in broadening our common ground on composition of the Council.
Mr President
We have no illusions about the difficulty of the task of reforming the Security Council. We are, nevertheless, confident that with creativity, imagination and goodwill, we can make progress. Australia for its part stands ready to play a constructive and positive role.
Thank you Mr President.