Pakistan joins the UN Security Council in the New Year subtly changing the balance in the world organisation’s highest decision-making body and getting a virtual veto power over sanctioning terrorists it harbours. Elected in June as a non-permanent member, it will replace Japan for a two-year term on one of the two seats for Asia Pacific countries in the Council.

Pakistan received 182 votes in the 193-member General Assembly for its eighth turn on the Council.

Now Islamabad will not have to rely on Beijing to protect its terrorists like the mastermind of the 26/11 Mumbai attacks, Sajid Mir, at the Islamic State and Al-Qaida Sanctions Committee, which designates individuals and groups associated with those two organisations as terrorists and imposes sanctions.

Although only permanent members have a veto over decisions of the Council, non-permanent members have a virtual veto in the sanctions committees for terrorism because they act through consensus under accepted norms.

The virtual veto given by the consensus procedure has been denounced, with New Zealand, a former head of the Islamic State-al-Qaida sanctions panel calling it "the single biggest inhibitor to Committee effectiveness,"

India has described the working of the sanctions committees as "subterranean" based on "obscure practices" without legal basis and called for transparency so that the rationale for decisions and how they are made are revealed.

Pakistan also gets a soapbox at the Council to amplify its campaign on Kashmir, an issue it routinely brings up regardless of the subject under discussion, launching virulent attacks on India.

Change in power balance 

However, this will be more of a continuing publicity stunt because it has been a voice in the wilderness unable to get any other country to join in despite trying to link Kashmir to the Palestine problem.

When Pakistan takes the presidency of the Council in July it can convene at least two of what are called Signature Events on topics of its choice with high-level participation, both its own and invitees.

Even if it doesn’t directly make it an anti-India show, it can take a topic that it can manipulate for propaganda on India and Kashmir.

With Japan retiring, there is a subtle change in the balance at the polarised Council where a triumvirate of China, Russia and Pakistan will emerge on many issues.

The other Asian member is Korea, which like Japan, is pro-Western.

In the General Assembly, Pakistan has tracked China’s voting on many issues, especially Ukraine when it joined Beijing in voting on a resolution naming Russia as the aggressor, while generally abstaining.  

On Palestine, Pakistan has been a vociferous supporter of its cause and can be expected to raise the decibel in the Council, where it can go head-to-head with the United States, which will redouble its backing for Israel under President-elect Donald Trump who has said hardliner Elise Stefanik will be his nominee to be the permanent representative.

Islamabad straddles a dichotomy on terrorism – while backing or deploying terrorists against India, it denounces terrorism directed against it by groups like the Tehrik-e Taliban Pakistan (TTP) that it says are based in Afghanistan.

It can be expected to denounce what it describes as Afghanistan’s role in terrorism and try to get groups it says target it sanctioned.

The Asia Pacific group rotates its nominees for the Council, which are selected through consensus.

The group’s 53 members range from tiny Nauru in the east to Cyprus at the edge of Europe on the West.

After heavy canvassing, Islamabad got the backing of about 20 countries as diverse as China, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Malaysia, the United Arab Emirates, Lebanon and Singapore and the group endorsed it in 2023.