On 21 September 2023, the Foreign Ministers of the L.69 group of countries met in the margins of the 78th Session of the United Nations General Assembly, to exchange views on reform of the UN Security Council,
2. The Ministers agreed that today’s increasingly complex and interconnected global challenges further highlighted the urgency of reforming the United Nations Security Council in order to better reflect contemporary geopolitical realities, and to enhance its legitimacy, effectiveness, and implementation of its decisions.
3. The Ministers reaffirmed that expansion of the Council, in both permanent and non-permanent categories of membership, is essential to make the body more representative, legitimate, and effective. In this regard, they reiterated their expectation that the ongoing Intergovernmental Negotiations (IGN) process on UNSC reform will commence negotiations based on a single consolidated text, with the aim of delivering concrete outcomes within a fixed time frame.
4. The Ministers underscored the need for an enhanced role and presence of developing countries to improve the ability of the Council to respond effectively to the multiple, complex, evolving challenges the contemporary world faces on questions of international peace and security.
5. The Ministers stressed the importance of ensuring equitable geographical representation, especially for under-represented and unrepresented regions and groups, such as Africa and Latin America and the Caribbean, in both categories of membership of the Security Council. They reaffirmed their strong support to the Common African Position (CAP) and emphasized that Africa, given the historical injustice, needs to be fully represented in both the permanent and non-permanent categories of membership of a reformed and expanded Security Council, in line with the CAP as enshrined in the Ezulwini Consensus and the Sirte Declaration.