India must take the ‘Nuclear Option’ now? To get critical UN reform to protect itself and the Global South

On Nov 15, the Indian representative to the UN Security Council gave a powerful speech.

- PETER DASH

His apparent message: no more fooling around about UN reform after decades of lack of progress, including in not getting India its rightful place on the Security Council. (Times of India). And, according to India’s external affairs minister S. Jaishankar, “Central to the erosion of the UN’s credibility has been resistance to reform.” (The Hindu)

When it comes to any serious reform to give India its rightful place in the UN security architecture, the UN gets a big F. Failure for up to 80 years letting the Global South be treated as an inferior class on security. And in recent decades to slap the South down too often due to the West’s funding threats to “bankrupt” the UN if it did not fall in line with its hegemony. Remember when the US and UK left UNESCO and the Trump administration wanting to leave the World Health Organization in its first term if they did not get their way.

All this lack of meaningful reform for the Global South increasingly, to which India leads, will not end well if there are not serious reforms permitted by the Security Council permanent members P5 (China, France, Russia, UK, and USA), soon. Patience by India and the Global South have long run out, it seems. How do you like them apples, the “Great White North” if India now decides it is serious to exercise its “nuclear option” because of lack of progress. More about that later.