Interview with Amb. Sven Jürgenson, the Permanent Representative to the United Nations in New York of Estonia (2015-2022)

Interview with Amb. Sven Jürgenson,

the Permanent Representative to the United Nations in New York of Estonia (2015-2022)

 

May 11, 2024

 

 

 

Center for International Studies (CIS): We will be talking about the 2019 election, where Estonia participated and competed with Romania for the UNSC seat and won the election. Let’s start with a very basic question about your contested election. How did you experience the competition during the campaign? And – did you do something about it? Because Estonia had the “10 Point campaign plan”, and one of those points spoke about Romania and the necessity to stop it from running for the UNSC.

 

Sven Jürgenson (SJ): Well, our campaign with Romania was tough. We put in the candidature already in 2005. The election was in 2019, so it’s basically 14 years. But I would say like 12 or 11 of those 14 years were not very active. Because at the beginning, what you do and what Latvia has also been doing, you slowly make mutual agreements with other countries – you support us, we support you whenever the occasion arises. But then in the last two years, and especially the last year, there was, I would say, pretty much madness.

 

Romania was a very, very tough… I wouldn’t say opponent, because we were always trying, we were in friendly terms, the Romanians and their ambassador, I knew him for a very long time. And we always insisted on not saying that we are competing against each other, but we are competing with each other. One very important thing is that when you do a campaign, you should never do a negative campaign. You should not be viewed as being the tough one; people don’t like this. But Romania, for us, was a difficult candidate. And this is where the small states come into play. But I think this is the only environment where I can say it was important.

 

Where it was difficult for us, is a fact that Romania had so many more embassies in the world. We have our own 40; they have more than 100. We were not present in Africa at all. The only embassy we had was in Cairo. And that’s it. Romania not only was present in Africa, but because of the specifics of the Cold War, they had some special historic relationships with many African countries, because Romania was trying to be in-between during the Cold War. And the place to show that they are sovereign, and they have their say, was the United Nations, and Africa has 54 votes. It’s a huge number of votes. We specifically tried to find a way to neutralise this advantage that Romania had.

 

There were two different paths during the campaign. One is New York. And the other one is capitals. We were lucky enough to have our President, Kersti Kaljulaid was extremely involved. She took the leadership of the campaign around the world.

 

We tried to find a specific area of cooperation that we could offer and that we could work on. We tried to envisage the campaign as a win-win, in the sense that if we win the campaign, then we can get into the Security Council. But even if we don’t, we will get something out of the fact itself that we are campaigning, and that means new relationships in the world. But that, on the other hand, means we should find a real area of cooperation that we could use in the future. It can’t be just – we are coming, you know, to Addis Ababa, and we would like to get your support, and we are such a nice country and so on. It’s important to find something that will continue, and luckily enough, we had a good strength, which even for a small country doesn’t take too much capacity. That was e-governance, where Estonia was a front-runner in the world. And you don’t need hundreds and thousands of people to be sent over there to have cooperation, but you just have experts. The e-governance academy was created by Estonia and the UN together in Estonia. We used this capacity, and that worked and helped us to create relations in Africa that otherwise would not have been possible.

 

But really, it took a long time. We tried, at some point, to have a kind of agreement with Romania. But it didn’t work out. One of the things I tried to do in the Eastern European group was to have a kind of gentlemen’s agreement and a rotation so that we don’t compete against each other. Like, we put in our candidates in 2005, Romania, I don’t remember 2006 or 2007. But they picked a seat where there was a candidate already. The Eastern European group was always, with some exceptions, an easier group; the worst was the WEOG, their competition usually is extremely fierce. But in our case, it didn’t work out. And one of the things I tried to do was extremely informally, with the pint of beer, to sit down, to have a discussion, and then slowly become more official, and to have a kind of agreement. But then I started hearing in the city over there some kind of hint that Estonia must be in trouble. Why are they doing this? And I said to myself, okay, forget it. We competed until the bitter end, and we had the campaign both in New York and also in the world.

 

I think the campaign in New York is the most important, because in the capitals, you can get the promises from the countries, the decisions by the governments, but this is a secret vote. The Dutch ambassador, I remember, told me that about 30% of the countries get instructions from the capital and they follow them, about 30% of the countries don’t get the instructions, and 30% get the instructions, and they don’t follow them.

 

Therefore, the position of the ambassador himself or herself is extremely important. In our case, I think it was the second round, because usually in the first round, countries follow the instructions from the capital. And that’s where the capitals’ decisions are most important. But in the second round already, a lot of it depends on personal popularity and how the ambassador is viewed. And that means that it is really important for the campaign to be able to tell everybody that I am the person who is also staying for the membership and the Council. So that when I promised you something, it’s not only on behalf of my country, but also on behalf of myself. And if you trust me, then you can also trust Estonia being in the Council. And therefore, the second round for Estonia, I think, was the proof that we have done a good job in New York.

 

But in the Latvian case, I have to say, I’m a bit surprised that Montenegro has not stepped aside and made a deal. Because all the competitions for this seat are hard. But some are harder than others. And if you’re looking at Montenegro, their representation in New York, also their capacity in the world, I don’t see them as having a very strong capacity to do a strong campaign. And if I were them, I would strike a deal. Because I don’t, like I said, I don’t see them capable of winning. And when I left New York in 2022, they were not visible at all. I don’t know how many mutual agreements they had at the earliest stage, but I don’t believe the number is very high. But I think Latvia probably will have it easier than we did.

 

We’ll see. Contested campaigns are not only hard, but also costly, and challenging regarding the human resources that are needed. That’s a big pressure on small states. And my next question will be directed towards different types of resources – human resources, financial resources, time resources, every kind of them. How would you describe the capacity and the human resources you had for the campaign? Were they enough? How to make the embassy work in full capacity during both the campaign and the membership phase?

 

Well, if we start with financial resources, then yes, it is expensive, but it’s not that expensive, if you look at the government budget.

 

The problem that we had, when the active phase of the campaign began, was that a debate inside the country started – whether it’s worthwhile, looking at all kinds of resources that you mentioned, looking at the benefits that might come out of it, and so forth. It’s a completely legitimate debate. The problem we had was that the debates started at a moment when there was no way back. At first, the campaign was slow, and nobody was thinking about it. At that moment, there were all possibilities to just step aside and say, well, we will just abandon the idea, we will not do this. But then the government allocated some resources, even though it was 1/3 of what we had calculated. And the problem is that only then did the debate start. President Thomas Ilves, he was always against it. How it became a problem is that it happened exactly in the moment when we should have concentrated – all of us, the capital, New York, everybody – on the campaign and just go ahead, doing what we can to get in, and then you’re debating back home. And it didn’t really help.

 

So, the beginning was kind of rough.  But looking at the human resources, we had a team back home consisting of around five people or so directing the campaign. We had a big map, both in Tallinn and in New York, with red, green, and yellow markings, showing every country. For the team in New York, we didn’t really have additional human resources; we were working with the team that we had. There are important aspects of work to know in advance, but it’s not that difficult, because you can rely on others’ experiences, like Latvia can look at Estonia, and we were looking at Luxembourg and New Zealand. We looked at how big the teams were, what the division of labour was, and so on. And it’s pretty much the same for all smaller countries. No matter whether you are Luxembourg, which is really tiny, or Latvia, which is a little bigger, there is a minimum number of team members or division of labour that you need. And for the membership, we increased the number of diplomats three times. So we were, I think, 21 or 22, all together instead of six, seven, and I think it works well.

 

We started looking at these people right after we had won the competition, and they came a little earlier to New York. There is, for example, the Security Council Report, who are doing the training for new countries. We needed everybody there, by the time that the training sessions might start, we brought in also people from the capital to do it.

 

When you look at what you need financially – you need travel finances for the people from the capital, and, like I said, the President took the lead. We had a number of prominent ex politicians and important people, who could spread the message around the world. There is a travel budget, all kinds of gifts, and you need to do a lot of receptions and dinners. But this is all manageable.

 

When talking about human resources, there is difference between the preparation time, the membership time, and time after. As I said, we were 20, 21, 22 diplomats, all of them in their own fields. But this is a unique experience that you don’t get anywhere else. And when I talked to many – Lithuania, Luxembourg, New Zealand – my question was about the aftermath, the period after membership. They all said – when you have the debate before the campaign, whether it’s worthwhile, then one of the arguments for everybody always is exactly this unique experience that you your diplomats will get out of it. And that will play into the benefit of your future diplomacy. But most countries that I talked to said that actually it was an idea, but it never worked out most of those deployments, when the work was over. They went into just completely haphazard places where this experience was not really necessary.

 

And this was my idea, and I started it already during the membership, but it worked when it was over. Namely, I was doing whatever I could to find good places for those diplomats who were leaving New York after the membership. And I presented this also as a win-win. It was good for the diplomats themselves to get good jobs. But it was extremely good also for the Foreign Ministry to use this experience and not lose it. Because you get this experience for the countries of the size of ours so rarely. Let’s say, Germany’s there every seven years or so. But we have put in the candidature already for 2050. So, it’s 30 years. Basically, you get one generation of diplomats who have this experience. And I think it’s important for the ministries not to lose it.

 

The other important thing for us was, when you get three times more diplomats, what about the space where we will work? I didn’t want to have a separate office somewhere else, because that would basically mean that you don’t have good enough cooperation and coordination. Then you don’t work as one team.

 

For example, in the ministry, we had a part of the ministry that was kind of separate, and we called it Siberia, because these people are out there, and you don’t drink coffee with others, and you don’t chat. In New York, I was even almost getting close to having four or five or six diplomats in one room, just because they are not working there all the time. But fortunately, suddenly, and it was already in December, before the elections that were in July, there was an office space available, and we took the risk. It became available in the same building – we were already on the sixth floor, they were on the 10th floor, I believe. It’s just the elevator, and we rented the space already, before we won. There are all kinds of logistics issues that you have to be able to think about as well.

 

But I have to say that probably the human resources are the most important thing when you’re there. You need to have really good specialists, especially important is the Legal Adviser, to get into the nitty gritty and details of the procedural issues of the Security Council. It really paid off. There were moments when we won some debates, even with the Russians, who are considered to be the masters of the procedures of the Security Council, or the Chinese. There were a couple of occasions where Germany, the Americans or the French were looking at the Estonians, and we played the second procedural issue. This is really important.

 

It was the first time that we were in the Council, so we had absolutely no idea how it works. I was even afraid that it might be that in two years, when we are there, our people would not get any holidays at all, because the Security Council is working all the time. But we solved it. We had the division of labour – who is dealing with Sudan, who is dealing with the Middle East, who is dealing with legal issues, etc. We had the principal diplomat responsible for the field. And then we had a substitute, whose principal work was in some other field, but actually it was a substitute for Sudan, for example. That means – when one diplomat is on vacation, the other one takes over. And they were always supporting each other. It worked out really well. But yes, the resources are important. They are not small, but they are manageable.

 

And if you look at the experience and the visibility of your country that you get for the membership, I think it’s really worthwhile. If people would ask me whether I would do this again, and they have asked me, I said: the membership – any day, the campaign never! I would not do the campaigning again [laughs].

 

You mentioned the WEOG group and the EEG, where Latvia and Estonia both belong. Probably the competition in the WEOG is fiercer. But on the other hand, of course, this group consists of, I would say, very like-minded partners. If you look at our group, the competition usually is not that obvious. Of course, it wasn’t your case. But this group, it’s not very monolithic. We can’t say that it consists of like-minded countries, not at all. If you look at our group, how would you describe Estonia’s positionality in it?

 

Well, the Eastern European group is a very specific group. And the reason for that, you already mentioned, this is not a like-minded group at all.

 

If compared to other groups, especially the WEOG, which also cooperates on substance, when there are statements of whatever and positions, and so, the Eastern European group doesn’t do this at all. The Eastern European group is only for election purposes, because most of the elections are based on groups. But substantial cooperation or work doesn’t exist there. There is a once-a-month luncheon, with a rotational Presidency of the group, and there is this typical agenda you go through, that starts off with the Security Council overview of what has happened, but this is all really not going to substance at all.

 

And the outcome is that there was no lobbying or anything inside the group. I believe it’s become worse, like the Security Council atmosphere has become worse since 2022, because of the Russian aggression against Ukraine. I would not put any big emphasis on lobbying within the group at all. The coordination inside the group, like I told you, I tried to do this. And I was optimistic at the beginning, because there was a lot of support, but it didn’t work out.

 

The NB8 cooperation is very good in New York. But it’s hard to coordinate during the campaign among the NB8 because we are in different groups. The Baltic states are in the Eastern European group and competing with completely different countries.

 

In the campaign, you have to realise your strengths and your weaknesses. Because some of it might seem to be a strength to us, but if you look at the composition of the United Nations General Assembly, 193 countries, then most of them are not democratic countries. And they don’t like to be reminded about human rights and these kinds of things. Therefore, the strengths of the Nordic countries and the image of the Nordic countries do not look like a strength for all of them. At the same time, when campaigning and thinking about the votes that we might get, we should not lose or forget our values either. It has to be a kind of balancing act during the campaign. We also must stay credible. When you suddenly go in and are different from your usual image, that is also wrong; it will be quite well noticed by everybody.

 

But yes, the Eastern European group it’s a kind of nonsense group. We, Estonia, together with Slovenia, were actually the last ones not being members of any regional groups at all. We had the same motivation of not joining groups, because we thought, and I think it still applies, that the whole notion of Eastern European group is absurd. It’s a geopolitical divide of the Cold War. Why are Estonia, Latvia, the Czech Republic, and Poland, are in the East, but somebody else in the West? I think it’s a nonsense divide. And the group was only meant for candidatures, and at that point, we had no ambition to apply anywhere at the United Nations, because we still wanted to become members of the European Union and NATO, big things for us. We said, let’s wait. For Israel, at that time, it was different because they couldn’t join any group. And then finally, Slovenia decided that they will want to apply for the Security Council membership, and they joined the Eastern European group. And then finally, in 2004, we decided, okay, we will now join. And then Israel was taken into the Western European and others group. I would not take the Eastern European group very seriously at all, because it’s a nonsense group. It’s a very divided group. And it’s gotten worse.

 

That means we can’t rely on our regional group during the campaign. What about other types of alliances, partnerships? Maybe you have examples where you built partnerships across different domains, social or educational? Any other multilateral ties within international organisations, which were helpful during the campaign or afterwards when Estonia worked as an elected member in the Security Council?

 

Other international organisations are mainly relevant for the exchange of votes. You can make deals not only in New York, but also in other places, and not only in international organisations. We can support your fisheries decision somewhere when you support us for the Security Council, for example. These places are also relevant when you find a moment where you can work with somebody and get the support, and build relationships. Because you want to have an image of a country that would be good at the Security Council and that would also be useful for other countries, when you are at the Council. What are your values? What is your track record? And then there is something that is quite interesting – a lot of it depends also on personal relations. There is a possibility to create champions! And there was, quite interestingly, the ambassador of Mali, who was going around at every reception saying, you have to support Estonia. And when he’s saying this, it’s different from me, you know, when I’m going around and saying this. And then, in Central Asia, Kyrgyzstan, the ambassador was really pushing and lobbying among his own subgroup for Estonia. These are the kinds of things that are really effective.

 

If you look at the geopolitical environment, were there events or situations that helped to refocus or present yourself differently, as a problem solver, bridge builder, or any other type of profile? Does it play a role? Did you take the moment, the wave? How do you see this?

 

You have to be able to react to what is happening, and you have to be aware of your strengths and weaknesses. COVID-19 put a huge stamp on our membership, of course, because the whole city was locked down, and the whole world was locked down. The Security Council was the first one that really started functioning again in a few weeks, and they were testing the digital platform.

 

There was also an effort to have a resolution on COVID. Basically, the resolution would just say that it was calling for a ceasefire in conflicts in the world for the time of the pandemic. But it was a typical UN Security Council Resolution. It didn’t only say that but also had a preamble – all kinds of reminding this and doing that, and decided, you know, a long document, and it was completely stuck. And it was stuck, especially between the United States and China. Because the United States wanted to express where it came from – from China, and China didn’t want that. We took this opportunity together with Germany. It was ridiculous already – this pandemic in the world, and the Security Council is not even able to just have a simple short document saying let’s have a ceasefire in the conflicts for the time of the pandemic!

 

And we put an alternative resolution on the table, but at first it was not well perceived, especially by France, because there’s this kind of weird and in a way understandable, but in a sense a nonsense, feeling of ownership of resolutions when somebody tables it. As if it were my child, you know, how dare you come and intervene! But then, it was only in July, it was German Presidency of the Council, that the resolution was finally adopted. It took half a year. This is one example where you have to react and understand what your position is and what you can do.

 

And this is also another good example that in the Council, being small plays no role at all. Estonia’s role in the Council was no different from the German role. There is a role division between the P5 and the elected 10. On some occasions, not always, but being big or small doesn’t make any difference at all. We also had the penholdership on Afghanistan with Norway. On our initiative, we had the penholdership on Iraq, the monitoring of Libya sanctions with France. So, this basically depends on the level of your ambition, not the size of your country.

 

Then, when talking about COVID, how we grabbed the opportunity, we organised digital Arria formula meetings. This was an opportunity for us, where COVID worked in our favour. Everybody was interested in what we were doing; we raised the standard and the status of Estonia very significantly by the quality of what we were doing. I also have to say it was not cheap. But it worked in our favour.

 

The main occasion where you can express your priorities, where your role is emphasised, is your presidency. We had, luckily, two presidencies. What played in our favour was our strength in it – what we were pushing in the world for a very, very long time was cybersecurity. One of our achievements is that we could get cybersecurity officially on the Security Council table for the first time. It’s really hard to get new subjects or new issues on the Security Council table because the Council, especially Russia and China, are very conservative. The Security Council is supposed to be taking care of issues of international peace and security, but it defines peace and security in very narrow terms. Normally, you can get something to the table once the conflict is there. If there are issues that you could call political security issues, as a member of the Council, you are able to take that to the table, but otherwise, you wouldn’t.

 

Even though we were in the Council before the full-scale aggression of Russia against Ukraine, the conflict was there all the time. I think it was really positive that, starting from 2014, we had very good members of the Security Council from the Eastern European group. The first was Lithuania, then it was Poland, then it was us. We always had countries that would keep the issue on the table. And I thought – who will come after us, after Albania? If you had a country like Belarus in the Council, it would be a disaster. And it was our initiative, actually, that we have Slovenia in the Council. There was only one candidate at that time, and it was Belarus. We were trying like crazy, it took half a year or even more, to lobby and to find somebody in the Eastern European group who would step in as a candidate next to Belarus. Can we imagine now Russia and Belarus being in the Council? And so, finally, Slovenia stepped in, and they won the election. Luckily.

 

This is a kind of cooperation that is needed in the Eastern European group. The like-minded countries in the group could really look at all elections, not only in the Security Council, but look at all elections, and see that Russia and Belarus and some of their satellites would not get in.

 

What would you answer the question usually asked about the membership at the UNSC – is it worth it? It can’t make many important decisions. That’s the truth. But we run for the seat in that institution. So, is it worth it? What are the benefits?

 

I would start with counterarguments. The first one – the Security Council is not relevant, is not doing anything, in a way. It’s true. But at the same time, being at the table with others, to be able to work with others on the most important issues in the world, it’s a lot. You can say, the United Nations is not relevant at all, there is war in Ukraine, the Middle East is not solved, look at Libya, look at Myanmar, nothing is solved. But at the same time, there is peacekeeping, there is disaster relief, and there is UNICEF, which is doing a fabulous job. There are things you can’t imagine without the United Nations.

 

The world without the United Nations would be even worse. I have a photo from the period when it was really, really tough between Armenia and Azerbaijan. And I took the picture of the Armenian and Azerbaijanian ambassadors at one tiny reception at an Austrian ambassador’s place where they were sitting, having a glass of wine at the table, two of them just talking to each other. There’s only one place where they can talk.

 

The United Nations is reflecting the end of the Second World War, especially the Security Council composition, it’s nonsense. But at the same time, you know, it is there, and it’s better to be there with other countries. The second objection that we heard so much was that it’s only the permanent five that decide everything, and the elected members don’t matter. And it’s stupid to be there. This is completely wrong. What distinguishes permanent members from elected members is basically the veto right, and now there is more and more veto, especially after the beginning of the war in Ukraine. But for most of the issues, we did not work as five plus 10, we worked as 15. I never had a feeling that I was a younger or smaller brother. There was fear that you would be pushed to make decisions on issues that you otherwise wouldn’t like to take. Decisions that would spoil your alliances, your relations with your closest allies. This turned out to be completely false. The membership strengthened our relations with our partners. Not only did it not break a relationship, but it really strengthened the relationship.

 

Then, if you look at the resources, yes, it is going to take some resources, especially financial and human resources. But again, looking at the state budget, the size of the Foreign Ministry, it’s not that big. If you get additional diplomats sent over to New York for a certain amount of time, the budget is there, but it’s not billions; it’s all manageable. And like I said, the relationships that you have with other countries, the image, and the visibility of your country in the world and in the places where you usually wouldn’t be as a small country, and also the experience that you get, might be needed in the future.

 

One of the experiences right away paid off. When Russia started the invasion, it was in New York really late at night, 11 pm, or something like that. And there was a Security Council meeting going on at that time. Some people were saying, what a coincidence it is, a Security Council meeting is going on, and at the same time, Russia is going in, and we are at the Council already. The reason why the Security Council was having a meeting was that our intelligence knew that the Russians were going in, and we thought maybe it would act as a deterrence. But when it happened, and we knew that it was going to happen, there would be a meeting that could react right away. Without the Security Council experience, I wouldn’t have known the logistics and everything. I invited my Baltic colleagues over, and as soon as the meeting was over, we rushed out to the door, and I gave a statement on behalf of the Baltic States about the war. I knew the place where the press conference was given right after the meeting, and I knew how it would work. And the whole world press was there. This is a tiny example of the usefulness of the experience that you get from the Council.

 

Now, we are still the only candidate for the elections in 2050. But I hope that there will be enough institutional memory in Estonia, and that the internal debate will be more informed.

 

But like I said, looking back, I think being in the Council is definitely worthwhile. The campaigns themselves are also something that shows what is wrong with the United Nations. I think the campaigns are just much too fierce, especially in the Security Council; other campaigns are easier. It’s just wrong, what is going on.

 

My last final question to you is about advantages, disadvantages, success, and failures. If you could sum up both the campaign and the membership.

 

Like I said, the disadvantage was even just the size of the country. Like I said, Romania had more embassies, and they had historical relationships that we didn’t have. The African countries, pretty much all their doctors have studied in Romania during the Cold War.

 

But being a small country is also an advantage because most UN member states are small countries. There is even a forum for small states with populations of up to 10 million, so you can do your campaign work in the group.

 

The other advantage was that we were running for the first time. Being small and running for the first time is an advantage at the United Nations, because there is, especially among the small states, a strong belief that everybody should have a chance. If somebody’s there for the seventh time, you know, why? But if the competitor’s there for the first time, let’s give him a chance! So, there are pluses and minuses of being small.

 

During the Council itself, like I said, the biggest achievement was to get cybersecurity to the Security Council table. And even though it might sound like a small thing, knowing the logic of the Security Council, how hard it is to get new issues on the table, and knowing and feeling how big and important a subject actually is, I think this was a major achievement that we had. Also, taking advantage of the COVID situation that could actually raise the Estonian profile very significantly among Member States is an achievement.

 

Thirdly, strengthening relations. First, with countries with whom we had pretty much no relations before, but even more importantly, making the existing relationships with our closest friends even stronger.

 

Even though looking ahead two years always looks like a long time. But looking back, it seems very short.

 

So, you should go there being ambitious. What you can achieve being in the Council does not depend on the size of your country; it really boils down to your level of ambition. Because there are some countries that would go there and would just sit there through the two years, move along, and vote like they are supposed to vote. And that’s it. What we were thinking was – if it’s the only chance in a generation, because next time will be 30 years from now, then let’s be as ambitious as we can.

 

But at the same time, let’s be cautiously ambitious, cautiously in a sense, that when you get to the Council, there is a very strong feeling of insecurity. Because it’s the first time for us, we are insecure about how it works, how capable we are, what we can do, what we can’t do, how good an expert Estonia will be considered in some fields, and so on.

 

But once we got more confidence, we grabbed more things. There are two different chairing and leading options in the Council, and one of them is basically for elected 10 – the subsidiary bodies, mostly sanctions committees, they are all chaired by elected members, permanent members never take this, they consider this to be a small thing. But the work is kind of automatic, and you have an expert who’s dealing with it. Once a month, or once every two months, you have the ambassador chairing a meeting, but it’s not a very big burden.

 

But the other thing is much more important, and it actually officially doesn’t even exist, that’s penholdership. The penholdership means that you are having a lead on specific subjects, you draft statements, and you communicate with other countries on the issue. And this is a very important work. It’s difficult to get there because the permanent members are pretty tough on letting anybody in.

 

After a year in the Council, we had the feeling that we were capable enough to take over penholdership on some issues. The permanent penholder for Libya was France, but it was also Germany. When Germany left the Council, we said we would step in, and that was another opportunity to build a stronger relationship with France, because we were working together. And the other one was Afghanistan. Afghanistan was extremely hard to get. It was Germany and Indonesia who left, and then it was open. It took half a year to convince everybody. We started slowly to explain why we are good at doing this. We got the Western countries pretty fast. The United States was a bit sceptical – a small country, how can you do this, and so on. But especially sceptical were Russia and China. The Chinese ambassador at some point said – maybe we want to do it ourselves, even though Russia and China never have any penholderships. But then we decided also to have continuity, because we will only have one year, and it’s important to have a like-minded country on the Afghanistan issue, and also to have a NATO country. We have to bear in mind, it was before the United States and NATO left Afghanistan. They left during our penholdership, so it was pretty hard in 2021. But we were able to convince with the work what we did that we would be a good couple. First, of course, we had to convince Norway to get them on board. And then when we were lobbying it, it didn’t matter whether you were big or small. I don’t think that we did a worse job than Germany did.

 

And the fact that your teams are small is, in a way, also an advantage. The work of the Council is not overwhelming; it’s not dealing with absolutely everything in the world. If you look at the agenda of the Security Council for the coming months, then there is an automatic agenda – once a month, you have to deal with Afghanistan, every three months – with Kosovo, there are certain issues that are coming up. You need a certain number of experts on these particular issues. But you can count the issues; it’s not an endless number of issues that you have to deal with. When you have a smaller team, you can concentrate on issues that you find relevant and the issues that are automatically on the table. We had cybersecurity, for example.

 

And then another thing, which was important. When you go to the council, you put your priorities forward. Your priorities are usually based on your values. Most countries, including us, think that the place where you can show your priorities is your presidency. We got cybersecurity in, but we started much earlier. We started actually with an Arria informal meeting, then we were working towards our second presidency. But in a way, it’s true that you can show and you can work with your priorities during your presidency. But even more importantly, what we didn’t realise at the beginning, you can show them and you can work on the priorities absolutely every day, on every single issue. When you’re talking about Afghanistan, you can talk about women’s rights. When you talk about Myanmar, you can talk about human rights. In every statement you make, your values and your priorities should show there. And so you can work for the whole two years. You can work your agenda. And I think this is another plus.

 

The weaknesses of the Council, like you mentioned, they’re all visible to everybody. But that’s what we have. The talk about Security Council reform has been going on forever. It will never happen, you know?