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| The UN General Assembly votes on non-permanent members for the powerful Security Council. Photograph: Phnom Penh Post |
Friday, 19 October 2012
Abby Seiff
The Phnom Penh Post
After more than a year of bitter campaigning, Cambodia saw its efforts to win one of five non-permanent seats on the UN Security Council fall flat early this morning after the vote went to South Korea.
In an election held at the UN General Assembly in New York, that stretched just past midnight local time and went into a second round of voting, Cambodia garnered just 43 votes—falling far short of the necessary two-thirds majority needed for the win.
In addition to South Korea, Australia, Luxembourg, Rwanda and Argentina won seats as well.
The loss comes as a blow to the Kingdom, which announced its candidacy for the seat in January 2011 and has heavily ramped up campaigning over the course of the past year.
All nine ASEAN member states agreed to support the bid, and government officials had, months earlier, claimed they'd received confirmed support from more than 100 countries.
But mere hours before yesterday's vote, diplomats maintained that the race for the Asian seat remained too close to predict, according to Reuters, and the vote, which Bhutan lost in the first round, had to go to a rare second round.
Cambodia's loss puts South Korea in one of 10 non-permanent, two-year term seats in the powerful, 15-member body that is tasked with maintaining peace but is capable of authorizing military action. Five other positions are held permanently, and with veto power, by the US, Russia, Britain, China and France.
Headed by special envoy to the prime minister Hor Nam Bora, who also serves as an ambassador to six nations and is the son of Foreign Minister Hor Namhong, the Cambodian campaign focused heavily on its experience with peace-keeping and nation building.
"Cambodia fully understands the pain and suffering inflicted by war and internal conflict and attaches great importance to preventing and resolving potential difficulties wherever they are," the Ministry of Foreign Affairs wrote in its official candidacy brochure.
The sentiment was echoed by Namhong last month when he pressed Cambodia's bid at the UN General Assembly last month, telling envoys the nation hoped a seat would allow it to contribute to: "the cause of peace, security and peaceful settlement of conflicts nowadays."
But while Cambodian diplomats have been stumping heavily, its efforts have been hotly contested by rights monitors in recent months who have urged the international community to take what they've termed a deteriorating human rights record into account before voting.
Officials at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs could not immediately be reached for comment early this morning.
6 comments:
HUN XEN IS A COMPLETE LOOSER!
You keep arrogant barking dogs like the ambassador to the UK, goevernment mouthpiece, and quick-sand press reactor crap like them and expected successful effort??? They are nowhere near being diplomatic savvy!!! Guard dogs. Yes, they are guard dogs. They keep flattering their naked emperor with foaming mouth until all of Cambodia realized too late that dictatorial regime is not good for the country.
They all should learn from the mistakes of the late King. With all his skills and talents, tragedy still befell on him and the nation he loved. Why, because he always thought that he was alone who loved and capable to lead Cambodia.
Burn his body over there (China). Don't bring back to Cambodia. He was a Traitor to Khmer people. The Khmer people have suffered enough by him. He did not respect even his own mother. He was an evil king . He should be alive until he can serve his punishment in the Khmer Rouge trail. Please don't forget he was the person who killed Lok Protean Sam Rainsy's father.
Pang Sokheoun, Secretary-General of SRP in Sweden.កុលបុត្រមហានគរខ្មែរ
Let's wait to hear from and see how the ambassador to the UK react to the UN member nations that did not vote for Cambodia.
The world does not think the same way like the abassador, his father, and his CPP givernment do, it does not share the notion of sole and eternal entitlement and privelege. Most of the world understand democracy and long for progress.
The ambassador to the UK, his father, and his CPP government on the other hand, believe and embrace the stability and stagnant of eternal one party, one man rule.
8:28 PM,
You are insane. First with the nonsense repeating of copy and paste, second for not knowing where to post your comment. This is a different topic. So stop being stupid?
One thing I don't understand why Cambodian people revered this King Kong as God King?
I called him King Kong because this is not a real King from bloodline of monarcy. This King Kong was put to the throne by the French.
After all, The King and Ah Hun Shit, they're the same shit which supported the communist Vietcong.
--Ah Vietcong is an opportunistic people, just like hyenas. All and all, our Khmer leaders is the one to blame just like Chey Chetha II, who gave Kampuchea Krom to Vietcong in the 1800s.
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