PHNOM PENH, Oct. 5 Kyodo - Cambodia is hopeful it will win a nonpermanent seat on the U.N. Security Council for the first time since it joined the United Nations in 1955, a Foreign Ministry spokesman said Friday ahead of voting scheduled for later this month in the General Assembly to fill a seat currently held by India.
“So far, more than 100 countries out of 193 who are members of the United Nations have supported Cambodia and thus we are hopeful to win the seat,“ Koy Kuong told reporters.
The 15-member Security Council comprises five permanent members -- Britain, China, France, Russia and United States -- and 10 nonpermanent members, which each serve a two-year term.
Cambodia, South Korea and Bhutan are competing for nonpermanent seat allocated to the Asia-Pacific regional group for the two-year period running from January 2013 to December 2014. They will need at least two-thirds of the total ballots to win.
In campaigning for the seat, Cambodia points out how it has been transformed from a war-torn nation -- one that required the services of U.N. peacekeeping troops in the early 1990s -- to a stable one with a robust economy that is now contributing to U.N. peacekeeping missions in other troubled countries.
“Cambodia would like to have the opportunity of showing its appreciation to the United Nations by taking a much more active role in serving the international community,“ the Foreign Ministry says in a campaign pamphlet.
It notes that since 2006, Cambodia has sent about 1,000 military personnel as deminers and engineers to countries like Sudan, Chad and the Central African Republic.
“Cambodia fully understands the pain and suffering inflicted by war and internal conflict and attaches great importance to preventing and resolving potential difficulties wherever they arise,“ it says.
It says that as one of many smaller, less-developed countries in the United Nations that have never had the opportunity to influence world affairs at the highest level, Cambodia would serve as their voice and push for greater democracy within the policymaking process “to create more of an equal balance between the needs of developing countries and more prosperous nations.“
Cambodia, it says, also would use its position on the Security Council “to press for significant reforms to the way the United Nations operates to create a more transparent, coherent and effective organization.“
==Kyodo