India becomes non-permanent member of the UN Security Council

Pune, June 18, 2020: India has been elected unopposed as a non-permanent member of the UN Security Council. The voting was held on Wednesday at the UN headquarters in New York, USA. India has become a non-permanent member for the eighth time from the Asia-Pacific category seat. India will be able to use this term better to advance its claim to a permanent seat. In seven countries contending for the seat, India was unopposed from the region for 2021-22.

India was the only candidate to receive the support of the Asia-Pacific group of member states of the United Nations, and no country contested. India has been elected to one of the five provisional seats in the 15-member council. However, some diplomats at the United Nations(UN) have made considerable internal efforts for this. Along with India, Ireland, Mexico and Norway also won the Security Council elections held Wednesday. There were 192 Member States present for voting and the 2/3 required majority was 128. India garnered 184 votes. Canada lost the elections.

India hopes to use its eighth term to advance its claim to a permanent seat in the expanded Security Council. Each new member of the Security Council is required to win two-thirds of the vote, which means 128 votes per all 193 countries’ votes.

Many times voting has to be done for this. The Security Council has 10 non-permanent members in addition to Britain, China, France, Russia and the US, the five largest veto-rights countries. Significantly, India’s candidature was unanimously approved by 55 members of the Asia Pacific Grouping in June last year. These included China and Pakistan.