Estonia, New UNSC Member, Bats for India’s Permanent Status

NEW DELHI: Estonia, which has entered UNSC as non permanent member for 2 years and was among countries to block Chinese efforts on Kashmir on Thursday, has strongly batted for India’s entry as permanent member of the highest UN body.

In a speech given at the Raisina Dialogue here on Thursday, Foreign Minister Urmas Reinsalu called for UN reforms and stated that India deserves a permanent seat on the UN Security Council.

The Foreign Minister said that Estonia is looking forward to working closely with India on global security issues if the country is elected to the Security Council for 2021-2022. “The future of the Council is a broader issue,” he said. “To defend the rules-based world order, the UN Security Council needs to be open and inclusive.”

Reinsalu added that Estonia supports an increase in the number of permanent seats on the Council, saying that the world has changed a great deal since the Security Council was created. “A number of countries – including India, Germany, Japan and Brazil – deserve a permanent seat,” he said.

Reinsalu also outlined Estonia’s principles for its term on the Council. “Small countries have an important, moral voice on the UN Security Council,” he remarked. “It is small countries that can play a key role as mediators when standing up, unwavering, for international law.”

Earlier the Minister told select group of reporters, “There is not even a centimetre of distance in our bilateral relations. We share values and this is why it is irrelevant that the counties are incomparable in size.”

At the meeting with the Foreign Minister it was discussed enhancing cooperation in digital technologies. “We spoke about the importance of safeguarding multilateralism.“

“At the meeting with Iran we reiterated the need for de-escalation and political dialogue. We urged Iran to cooperate with the countries whose citizens were on the crashed civilian aircraft on the full investigation. We stressed the importance to be compliant with the JCPOA,” the Minister said

”We would gladly see India opening an embassy in Tallinn and hope to see high level bilateral engagements in the very near future.”

Source: ET

Image Courtesy: BCCL