India on Thursday urged the visiting President of the 68th United Nations General Assembly John W. Ashe to maintain the momentum on expansion and reform of the Security Council so that there would be a concrete outcome by next year, 70th anniversary of the U.N. At his meeting here with Mr. Ashe, External Affairs Minister Salman Khurshid called for “clearly identifiable progress” during the Intergovernmental Negotiations.
India holds the static nature of the Security Council responsible for many unresolved conflicts as the world has changed tremendously in the seven decades since Russia, the U.S., the U.K., France and (later) China became its permanent members.
‘Creative phase’
Mr. Khurshid suggested transiting to a “creative phase” of the Security Council Reforms so as to achieve “concrete outcomes” by 2015.
Official sources said Mr. Ashe had assisted in a “decisive forward movement” on the Security Council reforms and injected momentum into text-based negotiations.
The Minister discussed with him the non-paper produced by an advisory group headed by Noel Sinclair, which injected more momentum into the process of Intergovernmental Negotiations, and hoped that the President of the General Assembly would make adequate use of it by commencing text- based negotiations.
An accomplished diplomat from the Caribbean, Mr. Sinclair is part of the group of diplomatic and other personnel working as close advisers to Mr. Ashe.
Thursday’s discussions also related to a post-2015 development agenda as well as matters of U.N. Peace Keeping and current developments on the agenda of the General Assembly, said official sources.
