Security Council’s Veto: A Necessity for World Stability

It all started when the United Nations was formed in 1945. The United States of America, the United Kingdom, France, Russia, and China were the victorious allies who came together to form the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council. The problem here doesn’t lay in the power that’s provided to these nations but it’s the nation’s self-interest and obsession for supremacy that misuses the power.

There are several loopholes in the UN Charter which make the process of eradicating the veto power practically impossible. The addition of new veto power nations can be made via an amendment in the United Nations Charter but to make the amendment two-thirds of the General Assembly including all five permanent members of the UNSC will have to vote in its favor, this only makes it theoretically possible.

China would never permit India to become a UN permanent member taking into consideration the strained relations between both nations. France would never give its seat to the European Union neither would the US, UK, and Russia give up their seats citing their greed for power. This in turn makes the situation highly complicated since there’s almost always a probability that a veto-powered nation may not vote in favor of an amendment but that doesn’t mean reforms can’t be made.

Even if we manage to somehow eradicate veto power and bring equality amongst all the fifteen members of the Security Council, do you believe that these fifteen nations will agree on a solution or will make a decision in the right direction? There is always a factor that will undermine a decision and in this case, the factor will be equality because there will be no driving force in the Council that will make the decision valuable to others. The League of Nations failed because it had no provision for a veto in its Covenant and that’s the reason why the majority of decisions taken by the League weren’t taken seriously by member nations.

When Mr.Putin referred to the veto as the profound vision of the founders of the UN and underpinning the international stability, he meant it for his defense as a veto powered nation, same goes for the Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi who said that the veto has an important role in checking proclivity of war. Though the United States of America, the United Kingdom, and France have never openly spoken about the privilege they bear they too have used veto for their own self-motive. 

Now taking into consideration the fact that the above countries would never give up their veto nor would they let any other nation join their elite group, we need to figure out different ways in order to bring about reform and make a real difference. One such reform can be brought if all those 188 countries without a veto come together and demand the elite five for permanent membership in the UN, this will put these five nations under immense international pressure and will in turn drive them to reform the Council! This idea seems impossible but it’s not, have countries like Pakistan or Sudan never dreamed of having the veto power? If the UN so believes in equality and international peace it will give everyone the privilege to become a permanent member! We can have five veto seats in the UNSC but this time every nation will get to be a permanent member on a rotational basis, this comes without saying that we truly need a mechanism by which we can remove a veto powered nation from its seat, the present mechanism is practically impossible as a UNSC member will be able to veto it’s own removal therefore only a two-third vote of the General Assembly should be taken into consideration while removing a nation with permanent membership.

The French initiative to regulate veto can also be implemented in addition to the above idea of making permanent membership rotational. The initiative to regulate veto states that the permanent members won’t be allowed to use the veto in case of mass atrocities, genocidal crimes, or large-scale wars. 104 countries have already pledged support to France’s initiative, this clearly depicts that the countries want to make a real change and it needs to happen now. Now, does the present situation sound better, or does a mechanism under which every country gets a chance to become a permanent member work better? 

It’s just a matter of a few years that a wrong decision taken by any of the present five members leads to World War III and the possible destruction of humanity. Now is the time to control our fate until it’s out of our control.