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27 July 2024

Chapter 3:   THE PEOPLE

Section 1:   The President

 

When a non-Council member clashes with a Council president over procedure, or vice versa

 

During the Russian presidency of the Security Council in July 2024, on 8 July the representative of Ukraine sent a letter requesting to participate in a Council meeting the following day. That meeting had been called for by Ecuador and France, the Council’s co-penholders on humanitarian aspects of the aggression against Ukraine, to debate Russian missile attacks during which the Okhmatdyt children’s hospital in Kyiv was devastated.

 

When a non-Council Member State wishes to participate in a Council meeting, the usual practice is to write a letter addressed to the Council President. However, the 8 July Ukrainian letter was addressed only to the “United Nations Security Council”. After the meeting had taken place on 9 July, the Ukrainian representative posted on Twitter/X an explanation for this. Addressing the Russian representative by name, he said “you are not a legitimate president of the Security Council, and I will never address you as one.”

 

Earlier that day, when the meeting convened, the Russian representative chairing the meeting said he would openly explain the situation regarding Ukraine’s participation. He contended that the Ukrainian letter had been “in violation of standard practice”, in that it was not addressed to the President and “does not even include the basic protocol language as is standard practice”. In this context, he referred to Rule 37 of the Council’s Provisional Rules of Procedure which provides for invitations to non-Council Member States.

 

In his Twitter/X post, the Ukrainian representative responded on the issue of whether or not Rule 37 requires that requests to participate be directed to the Council President. He said, “as for the Rule 37 of the Rules of Procedure that allows my invitation, there’s not a single word about the presidency”.

 

According to the Russian representative, the matter could have been resolved if Ukraine had sent a new letter “in due form”. However, this did not happen. That being the case, the Russian representative implied that his presidency would not have extended an invitation to Ukraine, had it not been that the United States - that is, a Council member - subsequently requested Ukraine’s participation. Consequently, the Russian representative chairing the meeting said that the presidency was inviting Ukraine “only on condition” of the American request. The invitation was then extended and the meeting proceeded.

The question as to whether there is a correct form for requests by non-Council members to participate in Council meetings is a grey area of Council practice, owing to the fact that it is not codified either in the Provisional Rules of Procedure or in any of the Council's presidential notes on working methods. This being the case, it is open to interpretation whether addressing such requests to the Council president is simply the usual practice or, in fact, a requirement. However, in light of the Council's overall practice, it seems more likely to be a question of protocol rather than of legal obligation. 

 

There have been other instances in the Security Council’s history when a Member State did not want to recognize a particular country serving as a monthly Council president. One case occurred in 1982 during the Iran-Iraq war. When a meeting on the war was scheduled for 4 October 1982, although Iraq requested to participate, Iran did not, owing to the fact that Jordan was serving as Council President for that month.

 

Rather than participating, Iran sent a note verbale addressed to the Secretary-General attaching the statement its representative would have made in the meeting. The note verbale explained:

 

“Since this delegation does not recognize the legitimacy of the Jordanian representative’s presiding over this discussion because of Jordan’s active participation in the imposed war, the Permanent Representative of the Islamic Republic of Iran is pleased to address the enclosed statement to His Excellency, the Secretary-General of the United Nations, and requests His Excellency’s instruction as to distribution of this letter and its enclosure as a document of the Security Council.” (S/15448)

 

This was a viable alternative approach. As mentioned above, when requesting to participate in a meeting, the usual practice has been for non-members to write to the Council president. However, other communications intended for the Security Council can be, and often are, alternatively addressed to the Secretary-General. When this occurs, Rule 6 is operable. It states:

 

“The Secretary-General shall immediately bring to the attention of all representatives on the Security Council all communications from States, organs of the United Nations, or the Secretary-General concerning any matter for the consideration of the Security Council in accordance with the provisions of the Charter.”

 

Accordingly, Iran’s addressing of the note verbale to the Secretary-General, rather than to the Jordanian Council presidency, gave it the status of an official communication intended for the Council and thus permitted its publication as an

S/ document.

 

It is not only delegations which sometimes have procedural issues with a particular Security Council president. Sometimes it is a Council president which feels constrained by normal procedure when dealing with a particular delegation. 

 

In 2012, the General Assembly adopted resolution 67/19 by which it accorded to Palestine “non-member observer State status in the United Nations”. On 23 January 2013, the Council convened its first open debate on “The situation in the Middle East, including the Palestinian question” since the adoption of the Assembly resolution. The Council President (Pakistan) extended an invitation to participate in the meeting to “Riad Malki, Minister for Foreign Affairs of the Observer State of Palestine to the United Nations’. Malki then sat at the Council table behind a nameplate reading “State of Palestine”. In her intervention, the representative of the United States affirmed that

 

“The United States does not consider that [Assembly] resolution [67/19] bestows Palestinian statehood or recognition . . . In our view, therefore, any references to the State of Palestine in the United Nations, including the use of the term ‘State of Palestine’ on the placard in the Security Council, or the use of the term ‘State of Palestine’ in the invitation to this meeting or in other arrangements for participation in this meeting, do not reflect our acquiescence to the view that Palestine is a State. That statement of our position shall apply to Palestinian participation in meetings of the Security Council or other United Nations meetings, regardless of whether the United States specifically intervenes on this matter in the future.”

 

This was still the position of the United States during its Council presidency in July 2013, when another quarterly open debate on the Middle East was scheduled. This placed the United States in the awkward position of having to extend an invitation to the “Permanent Observer of the Observer State of Palestine” in keeping with the practice supported by all other Council members. The American representative subtly circumvented the issue. Instead of the usual formulation of ‘I propose that the Council invite…’, she stated that “the President proposes that the Council invite the Permanent Observer of the Observer State of Palestine” (italics added). She thereby emphasized that the use of the appellation “State of Palestine” was being made in her presidential, rather than her national, capacity.

 

Strained relations between a Council presidency and a delegation can also appear at the end of statements, when a Council president may choose to say something other than the standard, “I thank the representative of [name of State] for their statement.” This has occurred a number of times, including when some presidents have addressed a fellow Council member. The most recent case was at the 9 July 2024 meeting on Ukraine detailed above. After the Ukrainian representative finished speaking, the Russian representative chairing the meeting said, “In accordance with the traditions of the Council presidency, and purely as the President of the Council, I am compelled to thank Ukraine for their statement.” Other presidencies have acknowledged the conclusion of a statement which they found nationally unacceptable by saying some variation of “Protocol obliges me to thank the representative of [name of State] for their statement.”

 

Cases when strained relations between a delegation and a Security Council presidency have impacted on procedural aspects of the Council’s business do not occur often. Moreover, as can be seen in the instances described above, when they do occur, they can usually be circumvented through an alternative approach devised by those involved, occasionally with the assistance of another Council member. Nonetheless, when such disagreements surface openly in the Security Council Chamber, they can sometimes bring negative attention to, or create misunderstandings about, how the Council conducts its work.

 

[A separate article will shortly be posted on this website which addresses disagreements over other aspects of inviting non-Council Member States to participate in Council meetings pursuant to the Council's Rule 37.]

The Procedure of the UN Security Council, 4th Edition is available at Oxford University Press in the UK and USA. 

The Procedure of the UN Security
Council, 4th Edition

ISBN: 978-0-19-968529-5

FOR INQUIRIES, OR TO RECEIVE NOTICE OF NEW UPDATES, PLEASE CONTACT:   scprocedure@earthlink.net

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