THE VOICE

The key to India becoming a permanent member of the UN Security Council is "not to touch the veto", US Ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley has said as she identified Russia and China as the two global powers against changes in the current structure of the Security Council.

​

"(This reform of the UN Security Council) is much more about the veto. The permanent five (members of the Security Council) have the ability to veto. Russia, China, UK (United Kingdom), US and France and none of them want to give that up. So, the key to getting India on the Security Council would have to be not to touch the veto," Haley said at an event organised on the US Capitol by US India Friendship Council.

​

US is open to Security Council reform and always have been responding, she said in response to a question from Swadesh Chatterjee, chair of the US India Friendship Council after she delivered her keynote remarks on "The Role of Congress in Promoting US-India Cooperation on International Issues."

​

Haley said the US Congress or the Senate can’t have much role in reforming the Security Council.

"Not really. They really can’t. Because members of the Security Council are not going to listen to the Congress on the shape of the Security Council," she observed.

​

Haley said the US is already on board, but there is need to focus "on Russia and China", the two permanent members of the Security Council who "do not want to see any" changes in the Security Council.

​

"It’s a UN issue, it’s going to require UN reform and I think, India has to go and bring together as many supporters as it can in order to really affect that change in the Security Council," Haley said.

​

For long India has been calling for reform of the UN Security Council.

​

India and a large number of countries believe that the current UN and its powerful Security Council does not reflect the ground realities of the 21st century.

​

Last month, foreign minister of G4 countries  ‘India, Brazil, Germany and Japan’  met in New York on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly to push their case for reform of the Security Council including expansion of its permanent and non-permanent members.

​

India has also received support from several other multilateral groupings during the current General Assembly session in this regard, including BRICS and IBSA.

​

Several countries have taken up the floor of general assembly to support India’s permanent membership.

​

SOURCE : REPUBLIC WORLD

US President Donald Trump has raised the prospect of challenging media licences for NBC News and other news networks after unfavourable reports.

​

He took aim at NBC, which made him a star on The Apprentice, after it reported he wanted to boost America's nuclear arsenal almost tenfold.

​

Mr Trump labelled the report "fake news" and "pure fiction".

NBC also angered the White House last week when it said the secretary of state had called Mr Trump "a moron".

• Trump's longstanding nuclear fixation

• Trump and the nuclear codes

• What is Donald Trump's IQ?

Mr Trump tweeted on Wednesday morning: "With all of the Fake News coming out of NBC and the Networks, at what point is it appropriate to challenge their License? Bad for country!"

Welcoming Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to Washington later in the day, the US president denied the NBC story.

"It is frankly disgusting the way the press is able to write whatever they want to write, and people should look into it," he said at the White House.

When asked if he wanted to increase the country's arsenal, Mr Trump said he only ever discussed keeping it in "perfect condition".

"No, I want to have absolutely perfectly maintained - which we are in the process of doing - nuclear force.

Media captionTrump: 'I want nuclear weapons in perfect condition'

"But when they said I want 10 times what we have right now, it's totally unnecessary, believe me."

He added: "I want modernisation and I want total rehabilitation. It's got to be in tip-top shape."

Defence Secretary Jim Mattis also disputed NBC's story.

"Recent reports that the President called for an increase in the US nuclear arsenal are absolutely false," he said in a statement.

The president's tweet about US broadcast networks provoked a free-speech uproar.

Walter Shaub, who led the US Office of Government Ethics under President Barack Obama, said it could lead to "the point when we cease to be a democracy".

The Committee to Protect Journalists said the US president's comment was a poor example for other world leaders.

According to NBC News, Mr Trump told a top-level meeting at the Pentagon in July that he wanted to dramatically boost the American stockpile of atomic missiles.

He reportedly made the request after seeing a downward-sloping curve on a briefing slide charting the gradual decrease in US nuclear weapons since the 1960s.

Attributing its report to three officials in the room, NBC said Mr Trump's request surprised those present, including the Joint Chiefs of Staff and Secretary of State Rex Tillerson.

Media caption Rex Tillerson reacts to a report he called the president a moron.

The network reported that Mr Trump had also called for additional US troops and military equipment.

The US has 7,100 nuclear weapons and Russia has 7,300, according to the US non-partisan Arms Control Association.

Media commentators say the president would struggle to remove broadcasters' licences if he wished to do so.

The Federal Communications Commission, which regulates US broadcasters, issues licences not to networks as a whole, but to local stations.

NBC owns nearly 30 local stations.

It would be difficult to challenge a licence on the basis that coverage is unfair, say pundits.

SOURCE : BBC.

​