United Nations, March 4 (IANS): With Ban ki-Moon's second term as secretary-general ending next year, India has called for making the election of his successor more democratic and open by giving the UN General Assembly (UNGA) a greater say and ending the Security Council permanent members' near total control of the process.
Bhagwant S. Bishnoi, India's deputy permanent representative, said: "The General Assembly, being the voice of the international community, must be given a greater say in the selection of the UN secretary-general."
India wants an end to the current practice of the Security Council recommending only one candidate on whom the UNGA votes for or against in a secret ballot.
"The Security council should recommend more than one candidate to the Assembly for appointment of the new secretary-general," Bishoi told a panel looking into revitalising the UNGA on Tuesday.
This procedure was adopted, Bishnoi said, in 1946 when a different world order existed and "it was desirable that the two cold-war adversaries agree on a common candidate before putting forward his name" to the UNGA.
"The situation today is entirely different and this provision needs to be changed," he asserted.
The UN Charter only says that the Security Council should submit it recommendation to the UNGA, which votes on the candidate, and does not say that only one candidate should be recommended.
Ban was re-elected to a second five-year term that began in 2011 and concludes at the end of next year. With the election process for his successor scheduled for next year attention is turning to how it should be conducted and to possible candidates.
Traditionally the secretary-general's post has rotated among four regions -- Europe, Latin America, Africa and Asia -- and if this system is followed it would be the turn of a European to succeed Ban.
A 1997 UNGA resolution that reaffirmed geographic rotation added gender equality as one of the criteria for electing UN's top official. Neither a woman nor an Eastern European has held the post.
Next year's election would be the first after the dissolution of the Soviet Union and it bloc where a European candidate can be in play.
On the overall functioning of the UNGA, Bishnoi said it should transform itself "from being a customary meeting place to a place where transnational issues that impact each and every one of us are addressed swiftly and truly global solutions are prescribed".
UNGA, he said, should have the prime role in development matters.
Turning to another aspect of the relationship between the Security Council and the UNGA, Bishnoi criticised what he said was the Council's tendency to encroach on the areas of UNGA authority "through extremely wide and permissive interpretations of what constitutes a threat to international peace and security".