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Namibia: Germany Consults On UN Reform
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The Namibian (Windhoek)
9 May 2008
Posted to the web 9 May 2008
Brigitte Weidlich
A TOP German diplomat jetted into Windhoek on Wednesday to consult and lobby Namibia about plans to reform the United Nations Security Council.
Namibia, as a member of a group of 10 African countries spearheading the reforms on the diplomatic front, is seen as an important player.
Ambassador Michael von Ungern-Sternberg met with Parliamentarians and the Foreign Ministry to discuss different options about Security Council (SC) reform to be discussed at the next UN General Assembly in September.
The diplomat is only visiting Namibia and South Africa as part of this diplomatic initiative.
Von Ungern-Sternberg told the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs, Defence and Security that he was aware of the common position of the African Union (AU), including Namibia, that Africa should get two permanent seats on the Security Council.
At present the SC has five permanent members with veto rights - the US, Russia, China, France and Britain plus 10 non-permanent members serving two years on a rotational basis.
The UN has 194 countries as members, while Germany also wants to become a permanent member of the SC.
"The UN reform was started under the previous Secretary General Kofi Annan and debate on the changes to the SC started in 2004.
The five permanent members understand the reform is necessary and that developing countries, especially Africa should be represented on the Security Council, but the big question is what is the right way," the German diplomat told the Committee members.
"A compromise solution might be to expand the time served by non-permanent members from two to 10 or 12 years," he added.
MP Lucia Basson, who led Wednesday's talks, repeated the AU demand to Von Ungern-Sternberg: to grant Africa two non-permanent seats on the SC and expand the body from 15 to 26 members to include Asian states, Latin America and Eastern Europe.
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Nora Schimming-Chase, who also serves on that Parliamentary Committee, said it was a problem that only five countries took major decisions at the UN, which she called a "club of governments".
"Since Germany does not have a permanent seat on the SC and thus no veto right, you can negotiate in a much freer way towards that reform," Schimming-Chase added.
Ambassador von Ungern-Sternberg returned to Germany yesterday.
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