“Think tanks” are beginning to play an increasingly important role in modern global politics. The 13th session of the CICA Think Tank Forum, held in Baku, demonstrated this once again. While discussions often focus on current political issues, fundamental questions tend to fade into the background. It was precisely this point that Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev reminded participants of in his address to the Forum.
The head of state touched upon a number of highly important problems, foremost among them the need to reform the United Nations Security Council. According to Ilham Aliyev, the UN Security Council has turned into an institution that no longer reflects today’s realities. He emphasized the need for UN reform and underlined the importance of ensuring representation of Global South countries among the Council’s permanent members.
This requires some clarification. The UN and its Security Council deserve criticism on many fronts, with their ineffectiveness standing out above all. One only needs to recall the four “Karabakh” resolutions of the UN Security Council, which remained on paper for almost three decades and were ultimately implemented by Azerbaijan itself during the 44-day Patriotic War. The war in Ukraine has also been a true disgrace for the UN, where the organization and its Secretary-General António Guterres failed to play any meaningful role. But the issue at hand goes deeper.
The UN Security Council is composed of 15 states. Of these, the permanent members with veto power are the United Kingdom, China, the United States, Russia, and France. These five have the right to block virtually any decision made by the rest. The other ten are non-permanent members, elected by regional quotas: five from Asia and Africa, one from Eastern Europe, two from Latin America, and two from Western Europe and other states. Such a political architecture can hardly be called fair — especially today.
What is not often said openly is that the UN emerged in the aftermath of World War II, reflecting the political balance of power at that time. The victors reaped all the “rewards,” foremost among them permanent seats in the Security Council.
But nearly 80 years have passed since the war, and much has changed. Today, transformations are particularly dynamic and can rightfully be described as the “awakening of the Global South.”
When the UN was created, colonialism was still in place. The UN was eventually forced to accept its dismantling and even adopt anti-colonial resolutions. At its founding, the UN had 51 members; today, it has 193. In the UN General Assembly hall, reporters and diplomats often note that it is physically overcrowded — no one designing it expected the anti-colonial struggle to succeed so broadly. Yet, as practice shows, expanding a meeting hall to fit 193 delegations is far easier than eliminating the colonial mindset. The major players at the UN still view Global South countries condescendingly, as mere “spheres of influence.”
Meanwhile, the global political architecture is evolving. New centers of power, attraction, and influence are emerging. Against this backdrop, the archaic structure of the UN and its Security Council can no longer be considered adequate. This is especially true regarding the composition of the Council’s permanent members. The views of these five states can no longer be passed off as the voice of the international community. President Ilham Aliyev reminded the world of this once again.
Nurani
Translated from minval.az
