UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) – The United Nations General Assembly on Friday approved – for the second time – postponing a decision on whether the Afghan Taliban administration and the Myanmar junta can send a UN ambassador to New York.
The 193-member General Assembly approved the UN Credentials Committee’s decision without a vote, which also deferred a decision on Libya’s rival claims for a UN seat. The nine-member committee includes Russia, China and the US.
The postponement of decisions on Myanmar, Afghanistan and Libya gives space to the current envoys. But the Credentials Committee said it “may return to consider these credentials in the future” at the Seventy-seventh session of the General Assembly, which expires in September next year.
There were again competing claims for seats in Myanmar and Afghanistan, with Taliban administrations and Myanmar’s junta pitted against envoys from the governments they ousted last year. UN recognition of the Taliban administration or Myanmar’s junta would be a step towards the international recognition sought by both.
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A rival claim was also made this year for Libya’s UN seat – currently held by the Government of National Unity in Tripoli – by the “Government of National Stability” led by Fathi Bashagha and supported by a parliament in the east of the country.
The Taliban seized power from the internationally recognized government in mid-August last year. When the Taliban last ruled Afghanistan between 1996 and 2001, the ambassador from the government they overthrew remained ambassador to the United Nations after postponing his decision on the seat.
Myanmar’s junta seized power from the elected government of Aung San Suu Kyi in February last year.
(Reporting by Michelle Nichols)
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