Daily Times

Pakistan has called on the UN Security Council to shift some of its focus on combating Al-Qaeda and ISIS/Da’esh to Hindutva groups in India terrorizing Muslims as well as on State terrorism brutalizing people under occupation, like those in Palestine and Kashmir.

“The Security Council’s work on Counter-Terrorism needs urgent reform,” Ambassador Munir Akram, permanent representative of Pakistan to the UN, told the UN General Assembly, which discussed the annual report of the 15-member Council on its actions to maintain international peace and security.

The Council, he said, has focused on combating Al-Qaeda and ISIS and their associates, while terrorism proliferated across the world. “The (current) listing and sanctions processes are cumbersome and politicized,” the Pakistani envoy said.

“The Council has also ignored terrorism by extremist and fascist organizations, including the Hindutva groups terrorizing Muslims. It has also ignored state terrorism which is used for oppressing and brutalizing people under occupation, as in the case of Palestine and Kashmir.

In this regard, Ambassador Akram said the Council also failed to distinguish between terrorism and the legitimate struggles of peoples under colonial and alien domination for self-determination. While awaiting agreement on the reform of the Security Council, the Pakistani envoy said several steps can be taken to improve transparency and accountability in its work, including open discussions allowing inputs by the concerned States and parties following the adoption of Council decisions.

He said the selection and appointment of expert panels and Special Representatives of the Secretary-General should be made transparently with balanced representation from the North and South and various regions.

The Council, the Pakistan envoy added, should set up a body to monitor and facilitate the implementation of its resolutions, including those in abeyance for considerable time, such as those on Palestine and Kashmir.

Expanding the number of non-permanent members is vital to enhancing its representativeness and reducing the dominance of its permanent members, Ambassador Akram said.

“Adding new permanent members will erode the principles of sovereign equality and equity and further paralyze the Council,” he insisted.

Opening the debate, the President of the General Assembly, Dennis Francis said what emerges from the Security Council report is “a vivid picture of a world fraught with tension and conflict”.

The President reminded delegates that “the millions of people mired in conflict, poverty and crises do not care about distinctions between the various bodies of the United Nations” — what they see is a single united Organization. While 2023 was a deadly year for civilians from Gaza to Sudan, geopolitical tensions have stymied the Council’s ability to preserve peace, Francis noted, adding that five resolutions and one amendment were vetoed in 2023. The 193-member Assembly is the most representative organ of the United Nations, he stressed, as he called on delegates to view today’s debate as an opportunity to exercise their right to assess “how the Council acts on behalf of you, the Member States”.

Afghanistan

A senior Pakistani diplomat has brought into the sharp focus of the world community the absence of the principle of burden-sharing as developing countries have been hosting the majority of refugees and displaced persons, with over a million Afghan refugees still in Pakistan.

“Pakistan has hosted over 5 million Afghan refugees over 40 years,” Ambassador Munir Akram told a session of the UN Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) on humanitarian affairs on Tuesday.

“Even today, we have over 1.4 million registered refugees, another 1 million unregistered and thousands who are entirely un-documented, the Pakistani envoy said.

At the same time, he made it clear that Pakistan will apply its laws regarding all aliens who are illegally in the country.

“We also hope that now that conflict has ended in Afghanistan, the 1.4 million registered Afghan refugees will be repatriated soon under a fully-funded UN Plan, as promised years ago,” Ambassador Akram added.

The world’s humanitarian crisis, he said, is caused by the growing impacts of climate change, proliferating conflicts, and the accompanying violations of international humanitarian law.

In this regard, he underlined the importance of early warning systems to mitigate the impact of climate disasters.

“Following the 2022 floods, Pakistan has developed capabilities to predict disasters up to 10 months in advance, with projections across all domains.

“We have launched a specific National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) app for public guidance and are prepared to share our low-cost models for global application,” he said.