PARSIPPANY, N.J. – Ukraine on October 15 won its bid for a non-permanent seat on the United Nations Security Council.
Egypt, Japan, Senegal and Uruguay were also elected to non-permanent seats for 2016-2017. All five countries ran unopposed as representatives of their respective regions. Their terms on the 15-member Security Council begin on January 1, 2016.
Ukraine had been expected to win the seat representing Eastern Europe, which is currently held by Lithuania. Also being replaced are Chile, Jordan, Chad and Nigeria.
Foreign Affairs Minister Pavlo Klimkin, who traveled to New York to campaign for his country’s election, said Ukraine has a broader global agenda but that its tone with Russia will “definitely not be conciliatory.”
“For the first time, we have an absolutely unique, unimaginable situation… that a permanent member of the U.N. Security Council is an aggressor in Ukraine, waging a hybrid war against Ukraine,” Mr. Klimkin said.
To win seats as non-permanent members of the Security Council, countries needed to get approval from two-thirds of the U.N.’s 193 member countries. Ukraine received 177 votes in the U.N. General Assembly.
The other members of the Security Council for the coming term are: permanent members (with veto-power) Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States; and non-permanent members (whose terms continue through the end of 2016) Angola, Malaysia, New Zealand, Spain and Venezuela.
Sources: The Associated Press, RFE/RL