“France supports the German desire for a permanent seat on the UN Security Council,” says a statement published on Wednesday on the website of the Federal Government, dedicated to the Treaty of Aachen on cooperation between Germany and France.
This will be signed on 22 January by Chancellor Angela Merkel and France’s President Emmanuel Macron in Aachen. The text of the contract has not yet been published.
The permanent members of the UN Security Council with veto rights are currently the US, Russia, China, the UK and France.
German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas has commented on the possibility of Germany becoming a permanent member: “Our expectations have never been greater.”
Former top diplomat Thomas Matussek also believes that the Federal Republic could become a permanent member of the body. At the beginning of the year, Germany once again gained a non-permanent seat on the UNSC.
The central body of the global, rule-based and multilateral order, will see Germany leading for the sixth time.
Matussek told Sputnik that in these “troubled times” the Council would be facing a “huge task”. The former diplomat was ambassador to the United Kingdom and India. As Permanent Representative of Germany to the United Nations, Matussek also worked in New York. For him, it is important that the composition of the Security Council reflects the actual balance of power in the world.
“Without overestimating Germany, one can say that at least in Europe it has a certain management responsibility. Because of its size, its economic strength, but also its great tradition of multilateral politics. Of course, many eyes are on us. It is a great task for us to live up to this expectation, not least in view of the fact that we are looking for a permanent seat on the UN Security Council in the long term.”
Matussek expects that the pressure of expectations will increase, because a country like India, which will soon be the most populous country in the world, is not represented. But neither is the continent of Africa, Latin America nor one of the largest contributors – Japan.
“First of all, because we are one of the two biggest contributors, but above all because we have shown in the past that we did not put the national interest at the center, but that we wanted reasonable multilateral solutions,” says Matussek.
If the Federal Republic actually gains a permanent seat, that would mean that not two, but three European countries are represented on the Security Council, and many members may see this as overrepresentation.
Chancellor Angela Merkel (CDU) has therefore proposed that in the future single EU states no longer occupy the non-permanent seats in the Security Council, but that these become “European seats”.
But the British and French will not give up their seats. In addition, it means that a supranational body would then be a member, which is impossible under the current UN statute. If the statutes are amended accordingly, there would certainly be other multilateral coalitions that want to have a say in how the world is run.