2009 United Nations Security Council election

15 October 2009

5 (of 10) non-permanent seats on the United Nations Security Council

United Nations Security Council membership after the elections
  Permanent members
  Non-permanent members

Members before election

 Burkina Faso (Africa)
 Libya (Africa, Arab)
 Vietnam (Asia)
 Croatia (E. Europe)
 Costa Rica (LatAm&Car)

New Members






The 2009 United Nations Security Council election was held on 15 October 2009 during the 64th session of the United Nations General Assembly, held at United Nations Headquarters in New York City. The election was for five non-permanent seats on the UN Security Council to serve two-year mandates commencing on 1 January 2010.

In accordance with the Security Council's rotation rules, whereby the ten non-permanent UNSC seats rotate among the various regional blocs into which UN member states traditionally divide themselves for voting and representation purposes, the five available seats were allocated as follows:

Nigeria was expected to run unopposed for a 2010–11 seat, but unexpectedly faced competition from Sierra Leone.[1] Nigeria has already served thrice in the UNSC, while Sierra Leone served only once.[2] Sierra Leone did not contest the seat, however. Instead, Gabon ran for the second seat.

Bosnia and Herzegovina was the only candidate country for the Eastern European group seat, as Poland withdrew its candidacy in order to give a strong support to the new Bosnian statehood. Poland then gave its support to Bosnia and Herzegovina and invited "all the countries which have already given their support to Polish candidacy, to back-up Bosnia and Herzegovina becoming a member of the UN Security Council."[3] Serbia announced its plans to run for the Eastern Europe seat.[4]

As Libya's term was ending, the new Arab representative would come from the Asian Group. One of the eleven Arab League member states in Asia would therefore succeed to Vietnam's seat in this election. Lebanon announced its intention to obtain this seat.

Brazil sought to replace Costa Rica.

This year, Bosnia and Herzegovina was elected to the Council for the first time.

Elected members

The five elected members after the 2009 elections were:

Results

All the candidates ran unopposed, so the election was expected to be a non-event.[5] Nigeria got 186 votes, Gabon 184, Bosnia 183, Brazil 182 and Lebanon 180.

Official results were:

Group A — African and Asian States (three to be elected)
Country Votes
 Nigeria 186
 Gabon 184
 Lebanon 180
 Togo 1
 Sierra Leone 1
 Iran 1
 Liberia 1
Group B — Eastern European States (one to be elected)
Country Votes
 Bosnia and Herzegovina 183
Abstentions 7
Group C — Latin American and Caribbean States (one to be elected)
Country Votes
 Brazil 182
 Venezuela 1
Abstentions 7

See also

References

  1. Nigeria, Sierra Leone in deadlock over UN seat - People's Daily Online
  2. allAfrica.com: West Africa: Sierra Leone, Nigeria Battle for UN Seat (Page 1 of 1)
  3. "Ministerstwo Spraw Zagranicznych - Portal Gov.pl".
  4. "Tadić: Kandidovaćemo se za poziciju u Savetu bezbednosti". Archived from the original on 2009-04-06. Retrieved 2011-04-15.
  5. "Five countries set to run unopposed for non-permanent Security Council seats". 14 October 2009.
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