UNITED NATIONS, April 8. /TASS/. The UN Security Council is set to convene within two weeks to consider Palestine’s application to join the UN as a permanent member, said Russia's envoy to the UN, Vasily Nebenzya.
Palestine's application should be considered "within, say, a few days, a week or two," he told reporters.
"We do not plan to allow this issue to drag on indefinitely, as perhaps some other members of the council would like," the envoy said.
Earlier on Monday, Vanessa Frazier, a Maltese envoy to the UN, said Palestine’s application was sent to the UN Security Council’s committee for accepting new UN members. Malta holds the rotating UNSC presidency this month. The Security Council held a meeting on Monday where Frazier asked Security Council members to weigh in on Palestine’s renewed bid to join the UN as a permanent member. There were no objections and she set the process in motion.
Palestine now is a permanent observer to the UN. In 2011, Palestine already applied for permanent UN membership, but it later decided to remain a permanent observer for some time. In April, Palestine sent a letter to the UN Security Council with a request to resume consideration of its bid to join the UN as a permanent member. Countries with this status can attend most meetings and have access to almost all relevant documentation, but have no voting rights. Apart from Palestine, only the Holy See, or the Vatican, has permanent observer status at the UN.
Countries are admitted to the UN by a decision of the organization’s General Assembly on the recommendation of the Security Council. The Security Council grants a recommendation if nine out of its 15 members vote in favor of the country’s application, provided that none of the council’s permanent members -the UK, China, Russia, US and France - vote against it. The application then must collect two-thirds of the vote at the UN General Assembly.