On Monday, The United Nations Security Council adopted its first-ever outcome documented on maritime security under India’s “Presidential Statement”. The UNSC was a high-level debate on maritime affairs which was chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
Sources said that as per practices, the presidential statement has to be adopted unanimously. The process was said not to be smooth with one P-5 country holding out till the very end on language related to the UN Convention of the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS). India’s negotiators deserved credit to be able to find language acceptable to all. India didn’t drop the reference to UNCLOS (which other P-5 countries insisted on retaining) which also reaffirmed the country’s bridging role in the UNSC. The key takeaways from the event included unprecedented high-level participation from other countries, the importance of the topic of maritime security, and the substantive nature of the discussion along with the adoption by the consensus of the first-ever outcome document on the topic.
The source further added that in its innings at the UNSC, this was the reaffirmation of the bridging and constructive role played by India.
