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Japan Renews Quest for Permanent UNSC Seat
Japan made it known that it hoped to take advantage of any momentum in reforming the U.N Security Council to secure a seat as a permanent member. The renewed attention to the issue comes in the wake of an announcement by U.N. General Assembly President Miguel d'Escoto Brockmann last month that he planned to press forward with reform of the Security Council.
Although currently a rotating member until the end of 2010, permanent status has proved elusive for Tokyo. The Japanese government felt it was on to a winning formula during the last major round of reform discussions in 2005, when it joined with Brazil, Germany and India to put forward a joint candidacy, known as the P-4.(...)
Japan has been increasingly active over the last few years in trying to shore-up support for an eventual candidacy, with successive prime ministers undertaking a charm offensive that has included first-time ministerial-level visits to smaller nations such as Estonia, Latvia and Uganda.
With the second-highest assessed contributions after the United States, which leaves it shouldering almost one-sixth of the U.N.'s total financial burden, Japan's foreign ministry believes the country has a solid case. It has also been quick to note that it has been elected more times than any other non-permanent member to serve on the Security Council.
Tokyo's ability to make that case, however, has been complicated in recent years by what has become a revolving door on the prime minister's office, with the country now on its fourth head of government in less than three years.
(...)Japan has a powerful case, but (...) it faces the prospect of opposition from other members loathe to see their own voting power watered down. (...) The trouble [is] that everybody agrees that you can't just put Japan on. (...)
Yokota [a professor of international law at Chuo Law School] says he hopes any difficulties can be overcome, in part because of the way it would reinforce Japanese enthusiasm for the U.N. (...)
But he says he worries that the longer the seat is in coming, the greater the risk Japan may one day lose what many see as its automatic right. "I think there's a good chance Japan could be a permanent member. But there's one condition -- that Japan continues to be the world's second largest economy," he says. "If the Japanese economy fails . . . then the world's expectations for Japan to be more active in the United Nations would shift to another country that is then taking the lead."
