Questions considered by the Security Council under its responsibility for the maintenance of international peace and security

Author(s):  
Ellen Jenny Ravndal

This chapter explores all aspects of Trygve Lie’s interaction with the Security Council, beginning with his appointment process and the negotiation of the relative domains of the Council and the Secretary-General. This was a time when the working methods of the UN system were rapidly evolving through political negotiation and responses to external crises. It examines Lie’s personality and character, how he viewed his own responsibilities in the maintenance of international peace and security as crises arose, the legal and political tools he developed and exercised, and his changing relationship with individual permanent members and the six elected members. In the emerging Cold War, Lie’s position in the Security Council would be determined in particular by his relationships with the United States and the Soviet Union. Taking initiative in response to external crises in Iran, Palestine, Berlin, and Korea, Lie succeeded in laying foundations for an expanded political role for the Secretary-General.


1954 ◽  
Vol 8 (4) ◽  
pp. 513-517

The question of the threat to Thailand was discussed by the Security Council at its 673d and 674th meetings. After again explaining the reasons for his government's belief that the condition of tension in the general region in which Thailand was located would, if continued, endanger the maintenance of international peace and security, the Thai representative, Pote Sarasin, again requested that the Peace Observation Commission establish a sub-commission of from three to five members to dispatch observers to Thailand and to visit Thailand itself if it were deemed necessary. The Thai draft differed from earlier Thai proposals, however, in that the original mandate of the sub-commission applie only to the territory of Thailand; if the sub-commission felt that it could not adequately accomplish its mission without observation or visit in states contiguous to Thailand, the Peace Observation Commission or the Security Council could issue the necessary instructions. Representatives of New Zealand, Turkey, Brazil, China, the United Kingdom, the United States, Denmark, Colombia and France spoke in support of the Thai draft. They denied, as had been alleged by the Soviet representative (Tsarapkin) at an earlier meeting, that Council consideration or action on this question would be detrimental to the success of the negotiations between the Foreign Ministers of the United States, United Kingdom, France, Chinese People's Republic, Soviet Union and other states in Geneva. While agreeing that it would be impropitious for the Council to consider directly the situation in Indochina as long as it was being discussed in Geneva, they argued that the question raised by Thailand was quite separate and that the Council had a duty to comply with the Thai request.


1957 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
pp. 103-120

On September 12, 1956, the representatives of France and the United Kingdom drew the attention of the President of the Council to the situation in the Suez. On September 23, they requested the President to call a meeting on September 26 to consider the situation created by the unilateral action of the Egyptian government in nationalizing the Suez Canal. The Egyptian government also requested that the Council meet to consider action against Egypt, particularly by the United Kingdom and France, which in its view constituted a danger to international peace and security.


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