• UNSC comprises five permanent members and 10 non-permanent member  countries

President Ranil Wickremesinghe on Tuesday said the Sri Lanka government will back the bids of India and Japan for permanent member status at the UN Security Council.  

President Wickremesinghe is currently in Japan to attend the state funeral of former Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe.  

During a meeting with Japanese foreign minister Yoshimasa Hayashi on Tuesday, President Wickremesinghe said he appreciated the support extended by Japan to Sri Lanka on the international stage and expressed the government’s willingness to support both Japan’s and India’s campaign to become permanent members of the UN Security Council, the President’s office said in a press release.  

India has been at the forefront of the years-long efforts to reform the Security Council, saying it rightly deserves a place as a permanent member of the UN body, which in its current form does not represent the geo-political realities of the 21st century.  

At present, the UNSC comprises five permanent members and 10 non-permanent member countries which are elected for a two-year term by the General Assembly of the United Nations.  

The five permanent members are Russia, the UK, China, France and the US and these countries can veto any substantive resolution. There has been growing demand to increase the number of permanent members to reflect the contemporary global reality.  

India is currently halfway through the second year of its two-year term as an elected non-permanent member of the UN Security Council. 

• There has been growing demand to increase the number of permanent members to reflect the contemporary global reality