Who's in, who's out: UN Security Council mulls reform

Washington wants the international community – via the United Nations Security Council – to take a tougher line on Iraq.

In reality, the council is not the "international community." It's the leaders of America, Britain, France, Russia, and China, meeting behind closed doors. This same quintet – the Security Council's only permanent, veto-bearing members – has shaped every major international peace and security decision since World War II.

Many in the rest of the world seethe at their exclusion from these discussions. Africa, Latin America, and the Islamic world, for example, have no permanent voice on the council.

But as the 191-member UN General Assembly takes up its annual debate of Security Council reform this week, there is a sense that now – amid a standoff between Washington and Baghdad – may not be the best time to push for reform.

"Everybody has some resentment and wants to say something about it, but in the short term, there is a problem we first have to face in Iraq," says a Japanese diplomat at the UN, whose country contributes nearly 20 percent of the UN budget and is a frontrunner for permanent member status. "But this is still an ongoing process, and the frustration of some members at not knowing what's happening with Iraq is just one more argument we can use in the future when saying that reform is necessary."

Even if the timing were better, though, observers predict that huge obstacles will continue to trip up reform efforts.

Resolutions of the 15-member council carry the weight of international law. But they pass only if they avoid a veto from the permanent five (or "P5") and garner nine votes overall. Ten nonpermanent members rotate through the council, each elected to a two-year term. Seats are allotted regionally: three to Africa, two each to Asia, Latin America, and Western Europe, and one to Eastern Europe.

Most reform proposals suggest expanding the council from five to 10 permanent members, and elected members from 10 to 11 or 14.

Beyond that there's little agreement. What should the new geographic composition be? Which new members should be awarded permanent seats? Should states be elected by regional groupings? Should new members enjoy veto power? Should the P5 be stripped of their vetoes?

"If you add another five permanent members, all of them casting vetoes, forget about anything being accomplished," says James Paul, executive director of the Global Policy Forum, a UN watchdog advocating council reform. "It's not just casting a veto, but the threat of casting a veto that keeps the whole issue off the agenda. A lot of council members wanted to act regarding Chechnya, but the Russians wouldn't even allow any discussion, much less action."

How did the P5 secure these privileges in the first place?

When the League of Nations disintegrated, having failed to prevent a second world war, that war's "victors" took another crack at forming an international body to bring stability to the globe. On Oct. 24, 1945, with 50 nations as signatories, the US, the UK, the Soviet Union, France, and China ratified the creation of the "United Nations" – a name coined by US President Franklin Delano Roosevelt.

Together, the five empires spanned much of the globe; they anointed themselves responsible for providing the money and muscle to "maintain international peace and security." Others saw them as simply protecting their own interests, but decided that was a small price to pay if it meant peaceful coexistence.

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