On February 23, 2022, the Ambassador of Ukraine issued a challenge to the Secretariat of the United Nations. He was highlighting the way the Russian Federation held, by arbitrary assumption, a seat on the United Nations Security Council after the demise of the Soviet Union. Such short circuiting of due process, within the United Nations, has enabled Vladimir Putin’s kleptocracy to use its illegitimate veto power to quash any effort to insure world peace. In the long run, it may also point to a potential cure for the UN’s impotence.
Partial Transcript:
I would like to avail the presence of the secretary-general and request the secretary-general to distribute among the members of the Security Council and the members of the General Assembly the legal memos by the legal council of the United Nations dated December 1991, and in particular, the legal memo dated 19th of December, 1991. The one that we’ve been trying to get out of the secretariat for a very long time and were denied to get it.
The Article 4, paragraph 2 of the charter reads:
The admission of any such state to membership in the United Nations will be effected by a decision of the General Assembly upon the recommendation of the Security Council.
Mr. Secretary-General, please instruct the secretariat to distribute among the members of the Security Council and the members of the General Assembly a decision by the Security Council dated December 1991 that recommends that the Russian Federation can be a member of this organization, as well as a decision by the General Assembly dated December 1991 where the General Assembly welcomes the Russian Federation to this organization.
It would be a miracle if the secretariat is able to produce such decisions.
There is nothing in the Charter of the United Nations about continuity, as a sneaky way to get into the organization.