Elon Musk advocates for India's permanent UNSC membership

San Francisco: Tesla CEO and Twitter owner Elon Musk insisted on revising United Nations bodies and called India, as not a permanent United Nations Security Council member is 'absurd'.

The American entrepreneur highlighted the problem in revising the UN bodies on Sunday and said that the countries with excess power don't want to give it up, adding that Africa collectively should have a permanent membership in the United Nations.

Taking to X, Musk said, "At some point, there needs to be a revision of the UN bodies. Problem is that those with excess power don't want to give it up. India not having a permanent seat on the Security Council, despite being the most populous country on Earth, is absurd. Africa collectively should also have a permanent seat imo."

UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres had also made an impassioned plea for the UN to reflect today's world.

"How can we accept that Africa still lacks a single Permanent Member in the Security Council? Institutions must reflect today's world, not that of 80 years ago. September's Summit of the Future will be an opportunity to consider global governance reforms & re-build trust" Guterres had said in a post on January 21.

India has been a non-permanent member of the UN Security Council for eight terms (16 years).

In September 2023, External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar expressed concern that the United Nations' reluctance to reform its structure would render the organization "anachronistic," prompting people to seek solutions elsewhere. He made an analogy by likening the situation to passengers on a bus, drawing an "injudicious" reference to the permanent members of the UN Security Council.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi noted, "When the UN was established, the world was completely different from today. At that time there were 51 founding members in the UN. Today the number of countries included in the UN is around 200. Despite this, the permanent members of UNSC are still the same."

(ANI)