UN needs reform: Alatas

UN needs reform: Alatas

SEMARANG (JP): Minister of Foreign Affairs Ali Alatas
underscored yesterday the need to reform the United Nations as
part of the on-going international effort to establish a new
world order.

In his acceptance speech for his honorary doctorate in law,
Alatas said legal certainty is all the more imperative in the
current globalization process.

The current international order is governed by the politics of
power rather than international laws, he said before professors
and law experts of the state-run Diponegoro University and
guests, including foreign ambassadors who flew in for the
occasion from Jakarta.

"For developing countries, certainty about the rules of the
game that everyone in this new world order must respect, is an
absolute necessity and is something they will always fight for,"
Alatas said.

The United Nations, as the only universal institution with
wide ranging authority and tasks, is the most appropriate and
effective mechanism for ensuring legal certainty, he said.

The UN Security Council should be reformed and its membership
expanded, not only geographically, but also on the basis of
objective criteria, he said.

The council's role, coverage and procedures must also be
reviewed in this reform, he said.

Alatas' paper yesterday was entitled "Indonesia's diplomatic
efforts to the establishment of a new world order." (har/emb)