UNSC bid of Japan, Germany, India and Brazil rejected. Is Japan to blame ?
Japan Times : 'G-4' submits resolution on UNSC, finds just 23 backers
Quote:
Japan, Germany, India and Brazil jointly submitted a resolution Wednesday at U.N. headquarters in New York to expand the U.N. Security Council, with only 23 other members listed as joint backers.
The four nations, coined the "Group of Four," submitted the resolution despite uncertainty over whether it would get the two-thirds approval, or 128 votes, needed for adoption by the U.N. General Assembly.
That's a far cry from what they needed.
Quote:
Foreign Minister Nobutaka Machimura will head to London to meet with his G-4 counterparts Saturday to discuss their next move, and with nations from Africa to solicit their support.
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No nations in Asia, where Japan has provided official development assistance for decades and hoped to gather support, signed the resolution.
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China, which is against Japan's candidacy for the UNSC, also lobbied against it.
Japan cannot find support among any Asian nation in spite of their heavy development aid and investment, so they turn to corrupt the already heavily corruped Africa. It strikes me as odd as Japan has very little natural affinity with Africa. Most Japanese people I have heard speak of Africa see it as a distant continent they know very little about. For example I was surprised to find out that most of the Japanese I quizzed (incl. my wife) didn't know even the name of about half of the countries in Africa.
How are really Japan's relations with Africa ?
Looking at the statistics for immigration/emigration, only about 9,000 Africans live in Japan, and 6,000 Japanese in Africa - and that includes Egypt, Morocco and South Africa. In other words, there is virtually no population exchange (even for business or international organisations) between Japan and most of the 54 African nations. This is a stark contrast to the almsot 900,000 Japanese living in the rest of the world and about 2 millions foreigners living in Japan.
Looking at the Japanese Exports, Africa's share is a mere 1% of the total, and over 1/3 of that goes to South Africa. As for Japanese Imports, only 1.7% come from Africa, over half of which from South Africa.
This shows that the entire African continent has in fact very little inter-exchange with Japan. So that makes me laugh when Japan has to look at Africa for support. This is not only true for the UN, but also for the International Whaling Commission, and other international organisations. This shows how Japan behaves when it cannot get the support from enough Western countries. It turns to Africa because they are easy to bribe, and because other Asian nations usually do not want to support Japan politically because of resentment still felt about WWII. This is what it means when we say that "Japan is an economic giant, but a political dwarf".
India Blames China while Pakistan forms UFC
India slams 'alternative proposals' on UNSC
Dharam Shourie (PTI)
United Nations, July 2, 2005
Quote:
In a harsh attack on UN member states like China who advocate consensus as the only basis for expansion of Security Council, India has asserted that the strength of developing nations is their numbers and to deny them vote would mean taking away their main weapon.
"To say that there should be no vote but a consensus is to disarm them (developing nations) of their main weapon. The rhetoric of anti-privilege masks the reality of a cynical defence of entrenched privilege," Indian Ambassador Nirupam Sen on Friday told the United Nations General Assembly's high level segment considering a document on UN reforms to be presented to a September summit of world leaders for adoption.
Rejecting proposals which either call for expansion in only non-permanent category or seek to deny developing countries a place among permanent members, he said accepting them would mean status quo which will neither empower General Assembly, not help enhance developing nations' role in the decision making process.
Sen said "a country that displaced another through a vote" is now proposing consensus for others, an apparent reference to Communist China's bid on October 25, 1971 to replace Republic of China as sole representative of China in the UN through a procedural vote. The Assembly had then rejected credentials of Republic of China and accepted those of the People's Republic of China.
"After winning the vote by a bare majority, it proposes much above two-thirds majority for others," Sen said without naming China. "It talks of participation of developing countries but blocks their real participation through expansion of permanent membership leading to improved working methods involving them in UNSC subsidiary bodies."
The Uniting for Consensus (UFC) group led by Pakistan and Italy and supported by China has proposed that expansion should be only in the non-permanent category by addition of ten members. But G-4 have drafted a resolution, which calls for addition of six permanent and four non-permanent members.
US pressured China into supporting Japan's entry, but it didn't for India ?? Both the US and China are opposed to the G-4 proposal, and the 12 nations in the Pakistan lead UFC, Argentine, Canada, Colombia, Costa Rica, Italy, S.Korea, Malta, San Marino, Mexico, Spain, and Turkey also choose to oppose the G-4 proposal.