UN sets the high table for India-The top UN body will be debating some contentious issues in the coming months beginning with Sudan referendum-2/1/11

UN sets the high table for India

Dipanjan Roy Chaudhury | New Delhi, January 2, 2011 | Updated 10:46 IST

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India's diplomatic skills will be put to some stringent tests as the country entered the UN Security Council (UNSC) on Saturday as a non-permanent member, after nearly two decades.


The top UN body will be debating some contentious issues in the coming months beginning with the Sudan referendum and the UN's Nepal mission in January.

Indian diplomats from its permanent mission in New York had been attending closed-door meetings of the Security Council ever since India was elected into the UNSC last October for two years with the highest number of votes. New Delhi has already made it clear that it believes neither the US nor its European partners have a right to use the UNSC to interfere in Myanmar or to have the final say on who won a disputed election in western Africa's Ivory Coast.

An article in the US global affairs journal Foreign Policy (FP ) reflects India's apparent intention. The piece titled 'India joins the Security Council, with aspirations for more', published on FP 's website, presents an assessment of India's UNSC role based on a briefing by an unnamed Indian diplomat.

"New Delhi intends to use its influence to press for a far more restrictive use of the 15-nation council to address many of the world's problems," he told FP . "The Security Council should deal with those issues which really constitute a threat to international peace and security and (avoid) this tendency to resort to permissive interpretations of what constitutes (such a threat), and in that process, to expand the work of the Security Council," the diplomat was quoted by FP as saying.

India will also support efforts by the 192-member UN General Assembly to "claw back" many of the privileges and powers it has ceded to the council in recent decades, including a substantive role in selecting the UN Secretary General, according to the article.

The two-year period (2011-12) will be crucial for India as it pushes for UN reforms and UNSC expansion along with Germany and Brazil. As sources say, India's stand on issues such as the Korean crisis and Iran's nuclear programme would be critical in boosting its claim for a permanent seat on the UN high table.