UN Secretary-General Selection Process Enters Second Day

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• published: 14 Apr 2016
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The three-day selection process for the post of United Nations secretary-general entered its second day Wednesday with another three candidates giving their vision statements at the UN General Assembly. The candidates who spoke on Wednesday were former Slovenian President Danilo Turk, former Croatian Foreign Minister Vesna Pusic and former Moldovan Minister of Foreign Affairs Natalia Gherman. Turk proposed to enhance the function of the UN's human rights council. Pusic said her first mission after becoming UN chief would be to simplify the UN's decision and reporting processes. Gherman stressed the importance of gender equality and suggested selecting UN officials without considering geographic factors. The selected candidate will succeed incumbent Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, whose term of office of expires on Dec. 31, 2016. Under the UN Charter, the secretary-general is chosen by the 193-member General Assembly on the recommendation of the 15-member Security Council. In practice, this has meant that the Council's five permanent members - the United States, Russia, China, Britain and France - have veto power over the candidates. That will not change in deciding whom to recommend to succeed Ban. During the selection process, each candidate is given a televised and webcast two-hour timeslot, starting with a short oral presentation. In addition, each candidate has already submitted, or will submit, a written statement about his or her vision for 2017 and beyond. Following these introductory remarks, UN member states have either two or three minutes to ask questions on behalf of their countries or geographic grouping. If time remains at the end of the two-hour period, candidates take questions from society. The three candidates who appeared on Tuesday were Igor Luksic, nominated by Montenegro, Irina Bokova, nominated by Bulgaria, and Antonio Guterres, nominated by Portugal. On Tuesday, another candidate announced his entry into the race: former Serbian foreign minister and General Assembly president Vuk Jeremic said in Belgrade that the government will be nominating him. Jeremic, with European integration and administrator of UN Development Program Helen Clark and former Prime Minister of Macedonia Srgjan Kerim, will be present at the General Assembly on Thursday. Four women and five men have so far thrown their hats into the ring - seven from Eastern Europe, one from Western Europe and one from the Asia-Pacific region. There is no deadline for jumping into the race, but diplomats said the Security Council is expected to hold its first "straw poll" on the candidates in late July. The 15 Council members will vote "encourage" or "discourage" on each candidate and the result will be made public. More on: http://www.cctvplus.com/news/20160414/8018643.shtml#!language=1 Subscribe us on Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCmv5DbNpxH8X2eQxJBqEjKQ CCTV+ official website: http://newscontent.cctv.com/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/cctv-news-content? Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pages/CCTV/756877521031964 Twitter: https://twitter.com/NewsContentPLUS