India is today a main player around the world: IGN chairman Ambassador Albanai

If a decision is made on the expansion of the UN Security Council, “” India will certainly be a competition, chairman of Intergovernmental Negotiations (IGN) about the reforms of the UNSC on Thursday.

“The aim of this Reformed Council must be representative. Of course, India is a main player on the world stage today. But it is [UN] is a membership of 193 countries. The consideration is representative of everyone and the entire membership of the United Nations, “said Ambassador Tareq Albanai during a press conference here.

“So sure, if the decision is taken that the expansion of the council goes from everywhere from 21 to 27 members, then India will certainly be a candidate and will be subject to the decision of the broader membership,” said Mr Albanai in response to a question by a question by a question PTI.

Mr. Albanai, who is the permanent representative of Kuwait of the UN, recalled that last year he had visited and co-chairman of ambassador Alexander Marschik of Austria India and had a conversation there “at the highest level” about the issue of reforming the UN safety council.

Updating the progress that was made in the IGN process during the current 79th UNGA session, the ambassador said that although the road to reform is “unknowingly complex, we are taking stable and meaningful steps in the direction of the path”.

He noted that apart from an increase in the number of members chosen in 1965, the first repetition of the Security Council lasted more than 80 years. “What formulation the Reformed Council takes, it must be designed to withstand the following century, anchored in the principles of inclusiveness, transparency, efficiency, effectiveness, democracy and accountability.”

Responding to a question about how many members an extensive UNSC should have, he said there is no decision yet, but the figures that are driven between 21 and 27 Member States.

To a question about text -based negotiations, Mr. Albanai noted that the position of India has always been to go to text -based negotiations as quickly as possible. “It is clear that this process will lead us to text -based negotiations”, because that is the “least complicated” part of this process.

“The most complicated part is to have permission on what that text contains, and then putting it on paper is not really that difficult … Do we have consensus? Yes, we have consensus on many issues related to the five clusters, many issues of convergence that we have able to put together all those years.

The five issues are membership categories, question from Veto, Regional representation, the extent of an extensive security council and working methods of the council and the relationship between the council and the general meeting.

Mr. Albanai said that he was “encouraged” by the momentum shown by the Member States in this session. “The spirit of reform requires both courage and creativity, and the active involvement of all delegations remains essential while we work to find consensus on the reform of the core elements of the reform of the Security Council.”

Earlier this week, the permanent representative of India told the UN ambassador, P. Harish, in a statement on behalf of the G4 -countries of Brazil, Germany, Japan and India, an IGN meeting that the existing UN architecture is from another era, which no longer exists and the current geopolitic.

Mr Harish said that membership of the Security Council must be increased from the current 15 to 25 or 26, with a reformed council consisting of 11 permanent members and 14 or 15 non-permanent members.

At present, the powerful UN organ consists of five veto-swinging permanent members China, France, Russia, the UK and the US, the remaining 10 members are chosen to sit at the horse shoe table for two years as non-permanent members. India was the last in the council as a non-permanent member in 2021-22.

The G4 countries have also encouraged Member States to submit further reform model to facilitate text-based negotiations. “We invite the chair to start text -based negotiations now, ideally at the end of the current IGN,” the group said.

Mr. Albanai and Mr. Marschik met Last February Minister of Foreign Affairs S. Jaishankar, who said in a position about X that he “appreciated their assessment of the current discussions about the reform of the UNSC”. “The international community hopes that under their stewardship the IGN process is progressing this year,” he has posted online.

After the meeting, Kuwait’s permanent mission said on X that both parties were constantly discussing developments with regard to the reform process, and ways in which it could be further developed.

“The co-presidents thanked the Indian Minister of External Affairs for the generous invitation and praised India’s dedication to this vital process,” said the mission.

However, Mr Albanai said that he could not say whether the reform would take place by 2030 or another year.

“I am very positive about the breaking of all the barriers that are there because people understand that we need something else and understand the Member States that this is the story of the world community to tackle all issues, including peace and safety, development and human rights,” he said.

“We all work together to make this a better United Nations … The reform process of the Security Council is part of that,” he said.