Karachi, Oct 29: Asserting that “friends were no longer friends of the country”, Pakistan today said India had played a “major” role in supporting its successful bid to become a non-permanent member of the UN Security Council.
“Many of the countries that Pakistan had considered as friends were no longer friends of the country. But India supported us in becoming a non-permanent member of the 15-member security council and played a major role,” Pakistan's Ambassador to the UN Abdullah Hussain Haroon told reporters at the Karachi airport early morning today.
Pakistan, which was challenged by Kyrgyzstan, was backed by 129 of the 193 member states in the General Assembly. Kyrgyzstan secured 55 votes.
The country will replace Lebanon, which currently occupies the Asian seat, on January 1, 2012, to begin a two-year term. Haroon said that Pakistan had worked very hard in the past six months to win votes for the prestigious post.
“I think we should not be discouraged by the reaction by some of the nations in the UN because I can say the world wants Pakistan to play a positive role in the global scenario,” he said.
Haroon said that Pakistan was committed towards multilateralism and promoting the principles and purposes enshrined in the UN Charter.
Haroon, while commenting on the Drone attacks by the US in Pakistan's tribal areas, said that he could take up the issue if the government authorised him to do so. “But we should not be scared of these attacks,” he added.
The Islamic country has been on the council six times earlier - 1952-53, 1968-69, 1976-77, 1983-84, 1993-94 and 2003-04. It will be the seventh time that Pakistan would be on the council, and the fourth time its term would overlap with India. Both the South Asian neighbours have shared terms on the Security Council in 1968, 1977 and 1984.
The Security Council has five veto-holding permanent members - the United States, Britain, France, Russia and China - and 10 temporary elected members without vetoes.
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