Nepal Prime Minister backs India's bid for permanent seat on UN Security Council

Nepal gave its backing Friday for India's bid for a permanent seat on the UN Security Council, saying it was needed to reflect the changed times and make it more efective.

Nepal Prime Minister Sushil Koirala told the UN General Assembly Friday that the UN, including the Security Council, need to be reformed "to reflect contemporary realities for making it more effective, representative, responsive and capable of handling the increasingly complex global problems."

He said Nepal was for expanding both permanent and non-permanent categories of Security Council membership and supported India, Japan, Germany and Brazil being given permanent seats. He added a pitch for the African continent and member states that contributed to international peace and security getting Security Council seats.

Koirala is scheduled to meet Prime Minister Narendra Modi Saturday morning.

Proposals to expand the Security Council, which now has five permanent members and ten elected to two-year terms, have been around since 2000, but have hit a stalemate in the General Assembly.

External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj and the foreign ministers of Brazil, Germany and Japan met earlier this week to recharge their campaign for permanent seats on the Council.

Koirala spoke of the "profound changes in the dispersal of geopolitical and economic power among nations" and said Nepal could benefit from the economic growth of India and China. "Peace, stability, and democracy in Nepal would pave its way for reaping the benefits from economic dynamism in the neighbourhood in recent years.," he said.

(Arul Louis can be contacted at arul.l@ians.in)