Friday, November 3, 2006

by Alfons Luna

UNITED NATIONS, (AFP): The UN Latin American and Caribbean Group (GRULAC) on Thursday delayed a decision on endorsing Panama as its compromise choice for a non-permanent seat on the Security Council, reportedly because English-speaking Caribbean countries were 'miffed' that they had not been consulted.

Panama was proposed as a consensus candidate by Guatemala and fierce US critic Venezuela, which agreed Wednesday to withdraw from their deadlocked contest for the council seat following 47 inconclusive rounds of voting in the General Assembly.

Diplomats said GRULAC's endorsement of Panama was a foregone conclusion but would come Friday at the earliest.

The 33-member group met Thursday but some delegations asked for more time to consult their capitals.

Some diplomats attributed the delay to English-speaking Caribbean countries, which were miffed that they had not been consulted although they have no problem with Panama's candidacy.

The 192-member General Assembly has decided to meet next Tuesday to endorse Panama as a non-permanent council member.

Meanwhile US Ambassador to the UN John Bolton welcomed Venezuela's failure to secure the council seat, saying that Caracas had only itself to blame.

Bolton told reporters that "the defeat of Venezuela certainly accomplishes our principal objective."

The US envoy lobbied hard for Guatemala, fearing that Venezuela, under leftist President Hugo Chavez, would use a council seat to oppose US measures and openly attack the United States.

"The Venezuelans defeated themselves through a variety of their tactics," Bolton said, citing as an example Chavez's "unconscionable speech to the General Assembly, which I think was taken by many of the members to be indicative of how they would behave in the council."

"It was an act of podiacide," Bolton said, using a word he coined to indicate that Venezuela had shot itself in the foot.

Chavez used his address to the General Assembly last September to call US President George W. Bush the "devil" and suggested that the September 11 attacks on the United States were self-inflicted.

He also characterized his ability to stymie Guatemala's candidacy as a victory over US imperialism.

Francisco Arias Cardenas, Venezuela's UN ambassador, told Union Radio from New York that "this has a lot of lessons for everyone," including Washington, which he said learned "it has to understand that it has to respect countries, cannot abuse its power and that much more is achieved in dialogue than in pressuring and blackmailing."

The United States "could not get what it wanted done. It could not force in its candidate, and it couldn't get us out of the contest," he argued.

The US State Department said it would support Panama for the seat if it is put forward by GRULAC.

"If, in fact, there's another candidate and that's Panama, we look forward to working with them and would support their candidacy," said department spokesman Sean McCormack.

Guatemala, which Venezuela sought to portray as a US puppet, won all but one round of voting in the General Assembly over the past three weeks for the non-permanent council seat being vacated by Argentina on December 31.

But it failed each time to obtain the required two-thirds majority needed to win the rotating council position, one of 10.

The assembly last month voted Belgium, Italy, South Africa and Indonesia to the four other open non-permanent seats on the council. They will replace Denmark, Greece, Tanzania and Japan, which will leave the council at the end of the year.

The Security Council is made up of 15 members, including five veto-wielding permanent members - Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States - and 10 non-permanent members.

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