JOHANNESBURG
African Union (AU) member states will continue to press for reforms at the United Nations, especially at the UN Security Council (UNSC), South Africa’s international relations minister said Monday.
At a media briefing held in Johannesburg, Maite Nkoana Mashabane said that, despite numerous recent changes in the world, the UNSC had largely failed to change with the times.
“One thing that has remained stubbornly unchanged is how the UNSC has become undemocratic, unrepresentative and has remained exactly where it was in 1945 [when it was established],” Mashabane said.
The UNSC has 15 members, five of whom are permanent and all of whom have the power to veto proposed resolutions – namely, the U.S., the U.K., France, Russia and China.
Many developing nations, for their part, feel it’s unfair that these five countries alone – some of whom, they note, occasionally back resolutions that lead to war instead of peace – have veto rights.
At Monday’s press conference, Mashabane also briefed reporters on South Africa’s role as rotating chair of the AU Peace and Security Council for the month of July.
She said her country, along with the AU, had made an important contribution to peace and security on the continent, but said still more had to be done, citing ongoing conflicts in South Sudan, Mali and the Democratic Republic of Congo.
“To achieve the AU’s ‘Agenda 2063,’ we must silence the guns on the continent by 2020,” Mashabane said, going on to assert that Africa would never achieve economic prosperity without first establishing both peace and security.
