NEW YORK: Pakistan has called on the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) to take “bold decisions” to secure countries’ compliance with the UN Charter’s principles and its own resolutions like granting the right of self-determination to the people of Palestine and Kashmir.
Pakistan’s Permanent envoy to the UN, Munir Akram told the council that the Council has multiple means available to it under the Charter to secure such compliance. Speaking in an open debate on ‘effective multilateralism”, he suggested that the UN Secretary-General should prepare an annual review of situations on the agenda of the council where its resolutions remain unimplemented or being violated.
He added that affirmations of commitment to the Charter ring hollow when no action is taken to stop these blatant violations of the UN Charter and resolutions of the UNSC on the two matters on the Security Council’s agenda.
Russia, which holds the rotating presidency of the Council for April, sponsored the debate. The session was a big appearance for Sergei Lavrov, who came to the UN headquarters in New York, his first visit to the US since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine started 14 months ago which saw him fighting with Western diplomats on the conflict.
Ambassador Akram said that today, international peace and security confront many threats arising from violations of the UN Charter’s principles; great power hostilities; a renewed global arms race, including in new weapons and; proliferating disputes and conflicts; spreading terrorism, Islamophobia, and hate; rising poverty; organized crime; and growing climate impacts.
UNSC resolutions’ derogation
The envoy said that a prime illustration of derogation from the Charter and UNSC resolutions is the situation in Indian Illegally Occupied Jammu and Kashmir (IIOJK), where the exercise of the right to self-determination by the innocent Kashmiri people, prescribed by the Security Council, has been suppressed and subverted by India through 7 decades of fraud and force; another is the situation in Palestine.
He said effective multilateralism could only be constructed on the foundation of strong international institutions. In this regard, Akram called for the UNSC to be enlarged and be more representative, democratic, transparent, accountable, and effective, rather than an enlarged club of the big and powerful States. He added that effective multilateralism, in short, must be inclusive, comprehensive, and equitable. –APP
