Statement by Permanent Representative of Ukraine to the UN Mr. Sergiy Kyslytsya at the UN GA plenary meeting on “Question of equitable representation on and increase in the membership of the UNSC"

Statement by Permanent Representative of Ukraine to the UN Mr. Sergiy Kyslytsya at the UN GA plenary meeting on “Question of equitable representation on and increase in the membership of the UNSC"

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Mr. President,

The delegation of Ukraine expresses its gratitude for convening today’s debate and commends your readiness to ensure necessary support to the process of the Security Council reform.

Ahead of the new cycle of IGN I would like to reiterate several points that my delegation deems important for ensuring progress in our IGN endeavour.

First – we must be ambitious enough to break the vicious cycle of year-to-year repetitions of our positions. Their only outcome will be another lightly updated list of convergences and divergences – very useful in terms of taking stock of where we are, but not in terms of bridging our positions. This brings me to the second point: new avenues for progress could be opened if we enter text-based negotiations. This step will re-energize the process and strengthen its result-oriented nature.

Being ambitious also means to go beyond the technical rollover nature of a decision at the end of the session. The relevant discussion at the General Assembly’s plenary meeting this June, when such an attempt was made, was illustrative in this regard. Hence it seems crucial for ensuring success of such attempts in future to provide much more time for drafting as well as to have broader ownership of a GA decision among the UN Member States.

Third, we consider that a text, supposed to serve as basis for negotiation should properly reflect the entire scope of positions and proposals, as well as acknowledge unchallenged proposals as commonalities. Among these unchallenged proposals, and this is the fourth point, is strengthened representation in the Council of the Eastern European Group. It is a matter of principle for Ukraine that an additional seat must be allocated to the Eastern European Group in the category of elected members. We reiterate that the EEG remains one of the least represented among non-permanent members in the Council, having just one elected seat for 23 member states.

Finally, my country will continue to insist on revisiting the role of the veto in the work of the Security Council. This is an indispensable element for the Security Council reform to be completed. It is absolutely inappropriate that a permanent member has a privilege to exercise a veto right during consideration of situations, in which that member is directly involved as a party to conflict. The delegation of Ukraine therefore strongly supports all initiatives aimed at limiting the use of “veto”.

We are convinced that legitimate reasons for restricting the use of “veto” by a permanent member of the Security Council should include cases of genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes, as well as conflicts and situations a permanent member is involved in and cannot vote impartially due to the conflict of interests.

Mr. President,

Since its signing the UN Charter has been amended 5 times, reflecting the changing world. Strikingly enough, the amendment process stopped 48 years ago, despite the fact that the world of XXI century could not be compared with the world of 1973. The world map has changed dramatically and such artificial entities as the Soviet Union are now a thing of the past. They disappeared from the world map, but they are still present in the UN Charter, In a nutshell, it means that in its current wording the UN Charter does not reflect the today’s world, neither de-facto nor de-jure. Once again, just look at the map and look at the Charter. Even the UN Secretariat understands it and uses for its publications the language that does not exist in the current text of the Charter since the Member States have not agreed on the changes. We have opened different clusters in our negotiations but we cannot agree on the fundamentals. It is time to do it! In conclusion,

I would like to reiterate that the delegation of Ukraine will be ready to engage constructively on all the issues at hand so as to ensure progress towards our common goal of reforming the Security Council.

I thank you.