NEW YORK: Five nations have been elected as non-permanent members of the UNSC after a vote in the UN General Assembly on Tuesday.
Guyana, Algeria, Sierra Leone, Republic of Korea, and Slovenia will join the UN General Assembly for maintaining global peace and security, starting in January, serving for two years period. They were among six nations vying for five non-permanent seats around the Council’s horseshoe-shaped table.
New non-permanent members of UNSC elected
The UNSC is composed of fifteen nations, five of which —France, China, the UK, the US and Russia— are permanent members, granting them the right to veto any decision.
The ten non-permanent members are elected by the UN General Assembly, which comprises all 193 UN nations, and in line with geographical distribution by region.
192 Member nations voted to fill 3 Council seats allocated to the Africa and Asia-Pacific Groups, and one each for Latin America, Eastern Europe and the Caribbean. Slovenia beat Belarus in the voting for Eastern Europe, taking 153 votes, while Guyana, Algeria, the Republic of Korea and Sierra Leone ran unopposed.
The 5 newly elected states will join Japan, Ecuador, Mozambique, Switzerland and Malta, as non-permanent members of the UNSC. They will take up non-permanent seats presently occupied by Brazil, Gabon, Albania, the United Arab Emirates and Ghana when their terms end on December. 31.
