India has the 'strongest candidacy' for reformed UNSC, says UN Resident Coordinator Sharp 

Shombi Sharp, the UN Resident Coordinator for India, in an interview to WION spoke on India's remarkable contributions to global diplomacy,while emphasising on New Delhi's role in UN Peacekeeping, South-South Cooperation, and Advocacy for Global South.

On UN reforms, and India's bid to be at the high table, UN's top diplomat to India, speaking to our correspondent Sidhant Sibal said, that"India, one could argue, has perhaps the strongest candidacy in that regard."

He emphasised that the United Nations recognises the need for political reform within the Security Council but stressed, "it's up to the member states" to drive this change.

Regarding the imperative of UNSC reforms, Sharp acknowledged that the UN's structure dates back to the end of World War II and underscored, "The world has changed dramatically since then. But it's up to the member states."

Highlighting India's pivotal role as a voice for the Global South, he commented, "India very clearly has, for a long time, been a leading voice for the Global South."

He commended India's G20 presidency, where it prioritized UN issues and the concerns of the Global South, aligning its leadership with the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

He also lauded India's extensive involvement in UN peacekeeping, stating that "India has contributed more personnel, troops and civilians, to UN peacekeeping than any other country since the very beginning."

Full interview:

Sidhant Sibal: Well, the UN is the most important multilateral organisation in the world. With me is the UN Resident Coordinator Shombi Sharp. Sir, welcome to WION. My first question to you is we saw a very hectic two weeks in New York where the general debate happened. If you can give a perspective as to what are the key outcomes from the general debate and essentially outcomes that impact the world.

Shombi Sharp, UN Resident Coordinator for India: Thank you.Mujhe Yahan Bulaney Key Liye Dhanyavaad.(Thank you for having me)

The world came together at this General Assembly, probably the most important general assembly that we've had since 2015, to take stock of the 2030 agenda and we're halfway to 2030. So, this is sort of, in a way, the halftime and the world was looking at where have we gone off track? Where are we on track? And unfortunately, the news is that we're very much behind schedule. We're only on track for about 15 per cent of the global targets on the Sustainable Development Goals.

For a third of the targets we've basically come to a halt or even regressing in terms of progress. So, the message was urgent. But there was very, very strong support for important political declarations.

We had the SDG summits on the margins of the General Assembly. We had the climate ambition Summit. We had pandemic preparedness, high level meetings. So basically, I think what we saw is that the important outcomes are that the world reconfirmed that the SDGs are the only blueprint that we have towards peace and prosperity by 2030.

The world reconfirmed the importance of sticking to 1.5 degrees, climate ambition as well. A lot of momentum gained here in New Delhi declaration with India's G20 presidency. In fact, there was a very clear continuum.

I authored an op-ed the week in between the two events, arguing that we need to take the momentum from New York to New Delhi from the G20, G21 to the General Assembly and I think that was achieved. Now we look ahead towards additional milestones within this very important year, in this very important calendar.

We've got the Marrakesh meeting coming up quite soon, where the Bretton Woods institutions, the World Bank and the IMF come together. Look at how they're going to reform that, we have COP 28 coming up in Dubai, where the world is coming together to look very specifically at climate commitments as well.

So, I think this is a very important part of a narrative. And again, here in New Delhi, India's G20presidency really kicked that off.

Sidhant Sibal: So, staying on the general debate, we saw a lot of countries calling for the UN reforms. We saw a lot of countries like Portugal and Bhutan publicly saying that India and Japan should become permanent members of the reform UNSC. How hopeful you are that there will be a movement on the reforming process? Because when it comes to the intergovernmental negotiation process, there hasn't been any movement we have seen.

Shombi Sharp, UN Resident Coordinator for India: I think everybody is in agreement that reform is necessary. The Secretary General Antonio Guterres has made a reform of the United Nations, reform of multilateralism, broadly speaking, one of his top priorities.

Now when we look at reform of the Security Council, for example, and this is something that the structure of the UN has been calling for, everybody recognises that the UN was and many of the associated platforms were designed at the end of the Second World War. The world has changed dramatically since then. But it's up to the member states. So, the institution itself can't change.

The member states have to change the institution. And this is where again, I think everybody is on board with the need to reform just how exactly to do that. This is really in the courts of the member states to decide. You know, I think we hear more and more support for reform than we have ever before.

And certainly, India, one could argue, has perhaps the strongest candidacy in that regard. So, the United Nations, you know, the staff and the institution, and we very much look forward to that political reform of the P5 of the Security Council, but again, it's up to the member states.

Sidhant Sibal: Sir we saw a lot of leaders talking about the impact of the Ukraine conflict on on many of these countries, especially on food, fuel, and commodity prices, the rule of UN and what role UN is playing, if you can talk about that and can play in terms of diffusing this crisis. The UN had a major role when it came to the Black Sea green initiative if you can give a perspective as to the role played by the UN.

Shombi Sharp, UN Resident Coordinator for India: Sure. Well, of course, I mean, the war in Ukraine has had devastating impacts on, the senseless and massive loss of life and destruction of property in Ukraine first and foremost, but also the impacts on the world have been great, especially the developing world, poor countries, in terms of scarcity and high prices and food and fuel and fertilisers.

So, of course, the UN's priority is to bring about a ceasefire to bring about a peaceful resolution. That's, that goes without saying, and the Secretary General has been working very, very hard since the beginning of the war to try to bring that in.

But unfortunately, that has remained elusive. So in the absence of peace, the UN has worked hard to try to help mitigate the impacts especially on the poorest countries. The Black Sea grain initiative that you talked about and the associated MOU helped, which was brokered together, between the UN and with the assistance of Turkey made a very important impact and that basically helped to release over 33 million metric tons of cereals of grains onto the market.

A lot of that going to developing countries, that helped to bring the price down very considerably, something like around 30 per centas well.

Now that has lapsed, unfortunately, so the UN Secretary General is calling for the reinstatement of that agreement to again allow grains to reach markets and to really relieve the pressure on the poorest countries.

Sidhant Sibal: Sir, on the sidelines of the general debate, we saw a number of programs including a program where India and the UN came together to focus on global south where you were also present, we saw a number of leaders, Foreign Ministers present and talking about India's role in the global south.

How do you see India's role in the global south? Do you see India as the leading voice of the Global South?

Shombi Sharp, UN Resident Coordinator for India: I think India very clearly, has for a long time been a leading voice for the Global South. And I think that very, that's coming out very, very strong.

For example, we look at the G20 presidency, not only did India put the voice of UN issues and the concerns of the Global South, on center stage, and oriented the whole G20 presidency around the SDGs. In fact, I like to call it SDG 20 because it was so much aligned the priorities of the UN and the Global South.

In addition, it was India's push to expand the G20, to bring in the African Union to bring in another 1.3 billion people of the global south now it's a G21.

So, I think we see that leadership very, very clearly. Now, that leadership is both in the sense of geopolitical leadership and policy decision making and influence.

Also, India is playing an increasingly important role in terms of helping other countries through South-South cooperation, through providing vaccines in a time of crisis, and pharmacy to the world in many respects. And we had a number of side events that we in the UN here in India together with Government of India and supporting that organised where we saw a number of different countries at the highest level Foreign Ministers, even Prime Ministers coming together and sharing their very heartfelt stories of how India has helped their people, helped human development within their countries, resilience, this sort of thing.

And we were even pleased to launch a new partnership between the United Nations, India and the Gates Foundation, where we are amplifying Indian-South, Indian best practice development best practice, and this content is really to the heart of what we're doing here in India, the UN system in India increasingly we're helping to identify Indian development best practice and take that to the international level for the benefit of other countries.

Sidhant Sibal: Sir, you already mentioned about G 20, India's G 20 presidency a lot of time but essentially, how do you see the convergence in UN's priorities and priority of India under its G20 presidency. India is still the president. It will give the presidency to Brazil in November. So, if you can talk about the convergences and how these convergences can help the world at a time when we know there are several areas of distress whether the conflict or whether it is the high inflationary prices of the food, fuel and commodity prices.

Shombi Sharp, UN Resident Coordinator for India: Absolutely, there are a number of key areas of convergence and I will just name a couple that sort of come first to mind.

But we were talking about reform of multilateralism. We're talking about the need for financing for development. And here reforming the international financial architecture is absolutely critical.

And India's G20 Presidency was putting forth very important language and important ideas and commitments to make that reform happen.

There were important studies undertaken by Dr. Singh and Larry Summers, that very much reflected and aligned with the Secretary General's SDG stimulus plan, which the New Delhi declaration actually welcomed which is the need to not just for incremental reforms in terms of the multilateral development bank's the World Bank, IMF and many others, but really a step level change.

We need a massive quantum increase in financing for developing countries to make the transition to make the energy transitions, just green energy transitions, digital transformations as well. So, we need at least $500 billion a year and additional resources made available plus several more trillion dollars a year when we look at crowding in private sector financing. So that's one.

Two, the importance of gender equality as the Secretary General says gender inequality and this is the great unresolved issue of our age. And India's G20 presidency put women led development at the top of the agenda of the list to do and we saw, for example, the G20-G21.

Now we'll have a ministerial level Working Group on gender equality which didn't exist before. And then thirdly, I would say climate action and just Green transitions. The green development pact actually within the New Delhi declaration is looking at a number of really important actions.

So, for example, tripling renewable energy capacities across the G20. and embracing the ethos of the Prime Minister's lifestyles for environment as well, understanding that that household's individuals have an important role to play in terms of meeting the climate targets that we have.

Sidhant Sibal: Sir, their new grouping, G20, is almost two decades old. They're just furious BRICS. Do you think the rise of these groupings essentially is because the UN is seen as dysfunctional? Or do you see that this could be another form of governance in a world which is rapidly changing?

Shombi Sharp, UN Resident Coordinator for India: Well, I think you know, as the Secretary General has said, there's no doubt that the world we live in is increasingly multipolar if we can use that phrase. And within this, for example, India is an incredibly important pole. Now, the fact of multipolarity does not in and of itself, guarantee peace and security.

We've seen what what's happened in history, for example, in the hands of the First and Second World Wars.

So now more than ever, we need strong multilateralism and I think that you know, what we are seeing is a response to that need. And so what we need to do is to together come together, and this was really the strong support for the outcome documents in New York just last week, to invest in institutions that we have to support multilateralism, and that is the UN I would say, first and foremost, that's also G20, BRICS and all of these different platforms that can really be complementary as we seek to find peace and stability within a new multipolar world.

Sidhant Sibal: We've already discussed India and the UN, but essentially, the role India played in the UN and what do we expect, if in terms of India, increasing its role in the UN? How do you foresee it if you can just talk about that?

Shombi Sharp, UN Resident Coordinator for India: Well, India has been a founding member of the UN, has been really a strong supporter of the UN since the very beginning.

Since even just before independence, the number of ways in which India plays an important role in the UN are both using the UN for important purposes and supporting the structure of the UN are numerous. I would mention just a few, for example, counterterrorism, India has been a very strong supporter of the UN's counterterrorism capacities.

And in fact, the Secretary General Antonio Guterres when he came to office his very first priority was to create an office for counterterrorism. India was leading Of course, he was presiding over the Security Council, held a meeting of the Counter Terrorism Committee of the Security Council here in India, Mumbai and here in Delhi, led to the that New Delhi Declaration, which was significantly increasing the capacity of the UN system to combat new technologies in the fight against terrorism and financing these sorts of things.

I would also mention that peacekeeping, you know, the UN has, right now, nearly 90,000 peacekeepers, active personnel in 12 different operations across the world. India has contributed more personnel, troops and civilians, to UN peacekeeping than any other country since the very beginning right now.

There are about 6000 active personnel serving and India also has been really a trailblazer. In terms of women in peace and security. India provided the first all women police units in 1960 in Congo, provided the first women units in 2007 as well, kind of regular peacekeeping troops.

And so, this is another area where India really has shown a lot of leadership. I can name many, many other areas in which India has been a leader. But we see India's role in supporting multilateralism and the United Nations is vitally critical, and we very much appreciate this leadership.

Sidhant Sibal: Sir you mentioned counterterrorism, I would like to delve into it. India has been proposing the comprehensive convention on international terrorism, it was proposed in 1996 but it hasn't seen much support, the common definition of terrorism still eludes the world. Do you think that this is something that will take time or will there be a convergence we can see among the member countries?

Shombi Sharp, UN Resident Coordinator for India: Well, it's really, it's not for me to predict. It's for the member states. So I would just say that what's very important is that while those processes are ongoing, that India is working with the United Nations and many different structures to strengthen the fight against terrorism and counterterrorism approach, as I've already mentioned, and doing so in a way that is now tackling issues like AI and cyber currencies, financing of terrorism, really modernising the response to the counterterrorism response. So, this is really an important element of the partnership between India and the UN.

Sidhant Sibal: My last question, India's contribution you've already talked about, but do you think certain challenges as well, especially when it comes to the security and safety of UN peacekeepers, we saw a UN peacekeepers sacrificing their lives during the Indian UN peacekeepers, recently so on the safety and security, but do you have to say on that, if you can talk about that?

Shombi Sharp, UN Resident Coordinator for India: Well, I think again, you know, we so greatly value the contributions that India has made towards international peace and security. In many different ways from the support to peacekeeping has been really one of the most flagships, let's say, initiatives.

I actually had the opportunity just today to participate in a ceremony at the Center for UN peacekeeping, India's army runs to where India's training, women peacekeepers, both from India but from all of the ASEAN countries all the member states within the region, on how to bring more and more women into peacekeeping.

Now this is vitally important, of course, just gender equality as a human right. But what we've seen the evidence is very clear that as women are brought to the negotiating table, the peace table and into the formula for implementing peace to peacekeeping that the results of peace efforts are much more effective and longer lasting, and also better able to adapt to the complexity of today's peacekeeping operations.

So, I think that's just another example of India reaching out and supporting other countries with the higher purpose of international peace and security.

Sidhant Sibal: Well thank you so much for speaking to WION and giving us perspective as to what happened at the general debate but also what we can expect when it comes to the UN's role in shaping the world of today.

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