A reform of the UN is long overdue, South African Foreign Minister Naledi Pandor told RT in an exclusive interview on Wednesday, adding that the global body must change alongside the changing world. Pandor is among a number of top African officials who have come to Russia to take part in the second Russia-Africa Summit in St. Petersburg on July 27-28. 

The UN Security Council has effectively “failed” to fulfill its original purpose, given its inability to prevent conflicts across the globe, Pandor stated. The international body needs to be reformed, the minister stated, while arguing against creating an alternative multinational institution to challenge the UN. 

“When we speak of a United Nations Security Council reform, what we’re speaking of is a greater representation, democratic processes. The Security Council has failed the world, because we have so much conflict all over the world, so it means the mechanism needs to be re-forged so that we can ensure peace and security,” Pandor told RT. 

The BRICS group, comprising Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa, is working precisely to achieve such goals, ensuring peace and security for all, according to Pandor.

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“We’re not standing against anyone; we’re not standing for anybody. We work for the good of the world,” she said, arguing that BRICS is against “weaponizing” anything. 

The African continent – and South Africa itself – has a lot to contribute to the emerging multipolar world in general and fixing the UN in particular, the minister believes. “South Africa went through a very terrible and torrid time of apartheid. We were oppressed by a minority oppressing the majority, we waged a heroic struggle against might and so we have an experience of dealing with unfairness,” Pandor said.

“And much of the world actually supported the apartheid state for a very long time, and there were very few friends who stood with us as we waged this torrid battle,” she stressed.

The experience of “oppression,” therefore, makes the country “a very good candidate for understanding the meaning of freedom, for promoting democracy in its full meaning and for supporting representativity,” the diplomat stated “A part of the political definition that we give to ourselves as South Africans is unity and diversity – this means we reject racism and all forms of prejudice, and I think we should bring that into the multilateral stage,” she added.