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G4 to continue negotiations with AU on UN Security Council expansion
Japan, Germany, India and Brazil will continue to negotiate with the African Union (AU) in coming weeks in order to get the UN General Assembly to adopt a joint resolution on the expansion of the UN Security Council before the September summit, German UN Ambassador Gunter Pleuger said Thursday. Pleuger made the statement to the press after he and his Japanese, Indian, and Brazilian counterparts met with General Assembly President Jean Ping. Germany and the other three countries, collectively known as the G-4 or Group of Four, aspire to become permanent members of an enlarged Security Council. Pleuger said that since Ping will go on vacation and the assembly will be in recess over the next two weeks, the G-4 will not call for a vote on their resolution on the council enlargement. "He (Ping) asked us not to request a vote. As we have always done in the past, we will accommodate the wishes of the president. Therefore, we will continue after the General Assembly resumes its work on August 22 when the president has returned," he noted. "In the meantime, we will still go on working on the resolution and trying to convince people to vote for it," he said. "We still think the G-4 resolution is the only one that covers the interests of all regional groups, and the only one that can muster a two-thirds majority." Pleuger insisted that there is "ample" time to push for a vote between August 22 and September 14, when the UN summit is slated to begin. The meeting between the G-4 and Ping took place hours after the AU rejected a G-4 compromise deal on Security Council reform at a summit in the Ethiopian capital of Addis Ababa. The G-4 had pushed for a vote by the General Assembly on its council expansion resolution before the end of July. But the date for such a vote has been repeatedly postponed due to strong opposition from the Uniting for Consensus (UFC) group as well as the lack of support from Africa. The UFC groups more than 20 countries including Italy, Pakistan, South Korea, Mexico, Spain and Canada. Under the draft tabled by the G-4 in early July, the total number of seats on the council would increase to 25 by adding six permanent seats and four non-permanent seats. It also provides for a 15-year freeze on the exercise of the veto power by the new permanent members. The Security Council is currently composed of five veto-wielding permanent members -- China, Britain, France, the US and Russia -- and 10 rotating, elected members with a two-year term. The AU is pushing for its own resolution on the council enlargement, which would add six permanent members with veto power and five elected members. At a ministerial meeting in London late last month, the G-4 agreed to meet Africa's demand for an increase of five non-permanent members in exchange for its drop of the request for veto power. Without the support of the 53-nation AU, it would be impossible for the G-4 to obtain the two-thirds of votes in the 191-nation General Assembly necessary for the adoption of its council reform proposal. Indian UN Ambassador Nirupan Sen told reporters that there is still a chance for the G-4 to strike a deal with the AU before the UN September summit. "There is no reason to think the (AU) decision is final. Nothing is final. The discussions between the G-4 and the AU will continue," he said. "When we come to an agreement with the AU, we'll bring it to a vote. We're certainly intending to do that." But the UFC does not echo Sen's optimistic view. "Realistically speaking, from now till mid-September, it would be impossible to net something out of these conditions," Mexican UN Ambassador Enrique Berruga said. When asked whether he believed it is time for Secretary-General Kofi Annan to back off from his call for a decision on the council's expansion by the September UN summit, Berruga replied: "Absolutely." Pakistani UN Ambassador Munir Akram said that a vote on the council's reform will be "highly divisive" and will be "in the final analysis a fruitless exercise, leading to a dead end." "We should hold negotiations patiently, not to be dictated by artificial guidelines and deadlines and try to find a solution that accommodates the interests of all concerned," he said. Assembly President Ping said he had proposed hosting a new round of dialogues between the G-4, the AU and the UFC. "We'll bring them together, but I have not yet talked to the African Union and a date has not yet been determined," he said.
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