UN: After More Than 50 Years, Somalia Is Elected To The Security Council

On Thursday, June 6, Somalia was chosen to fill a two-year non-permanent seat on the UN Security Council.

Through a secret ballot in the General Assembly, Denmark, Greece, Pakistan, and Panama also won seats on the U.N. Security Council.

The five nations were chosen by the 193-member world organization. Regional organizations, who typically choose their own candidates but occasionally are unable to come to a consensus, receive the ten non-permanent seats on the 15-member council. This year was not one of those surprises.

This time around, the regional organizations proposed Denmark and Greece for two predominantly Western seats, Somalia for an African seat, Pakistan for an Asia-Pacific seat, and Panama for a Latin America and Caribbean seat.

The newly elected council members will take office on January 1st, taking the place of Mozambique, Japan, Ecuador, Malta, and Switzerland, whose two-year tenure expire on December 31st.

They will join the five nations chosen last year—Algeria, Guyana, South Korea, Sierra Leone, and Slovenia—as well as the five permanent members who hold veto power: the United States, Russia, China, United Kingdom, and France.

The responsibility for preserving world peace and security rests with the Security Council. Due to Russia’s veto authority, however, it has been unable to intervene in Ukraine and has refrained from calling for an end to hostilities in Gaza due to strong connections between the United States and Israel.