New York: External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar will launch India’s campaign for a non-permanent seat at the UN Security Council for the 2028-29 term and also meet UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres at the world body’s headquarters next week.
Jaishankar undertook an official visit to Qatar, Bahrain, Kuwait and Oman from July 5-10 and is expected to arrive in the US Saturday.
He will launch India’s official campaign for the UN Security Council tenure 2028-29 at a special event in the UN headquarters Monday.
He will then attend the 3rd India-EU Trade and Technology Council meeting and interact with his EU and Belgian counterparts in Brussels July 14-15.
According to a schedule of meetings released by the UN, Guterres will meet Jaishankar at the UN headquarters Monday afternoon.
India had last sat at the UN horseshoe table for the 2021-22 term. Elections for the 2028-29 term will be conducted in June next year, when India and Tajikistan will compete for the sole seat in the Asia-Pacific Group category.
The UNSC elections will come amid significant geopolitical shifts as the world continues to grapple with challenges such as the Ukraine war, Gaza conflict and the US-Israel war against Iran.
In its message for its UNSC candidature, India has highlighted “#India4UNSC 2028-29 Peace, Planet, Progress.”
Prime Minister Narendra Modi, in his address to the Parliament of Indonesia this week, had said that the global order is changing rapidly, and in this context, “developing countries like ours are seeking equal participation and a greater role in global affairs.
In this evolving global landscape, India firmly believes that reforms in the United Nations Security Council can no longer be delayed.”
India has been at the forefront of years-long efforts for achieving reform of the Security Council, including expansion in both its permanent and non-permanent categories, saying the 15-nation Council, founded in 1945, is not fit for purpose in the 21st Century and does not reflect contemporary geopolitical realities.
Delhi has consistently underscored that it rightly deserves a permanent seat at the horseshoe table.
India has called for an expansion in both the permanent and non-permanent categories of UNSC membership, cautioning that reform of the UN Security Council will border on “failure” if only its non-permanent category of membership is expanded, as this will “fundamentally” not change the decision-making power-structure of the five permanent members.
With the UNSC reform process moving at a snail’s pace through the decades, India asserted that a “nothing is agreed until everything is agreed” approach must not become a tool to block progress.
“Status-quoists have tried to use this argument in their favour and thereby, entrench the existing inequities in the Security Council,” India’s Permanent Representative to the UN Ambassador Harish Parvathaneni had said last month.