Argentina's Malcorra sees no clash with Britain in bid to be UN chief
Argentina's Foreign Minister Susana Malcorra on Tuesday said she would remain impartial in UN dealings on the contentious issue of the Falkland Islands if she becomes the next UN secretary-general.
Considered a strong contender to become the first woman at the UN helm, Malcorra offered reassurances that her nationality will not create tension with Britain, one of the five permanent UN Security Council members.
"The secretary-general has always said he will be ready to do whatever both sides agree he should be doing," Malcorra told reporters after appearing at hearings on her candidacy.
"That will be the case of any future secretary-general no matter what the nationality."
The 61-year-old foreign minister was UN chief Ban Ki-moon's chief of staff since 2012 until her latest appointment by President Mauricio Macri in November.
Malcorra is seen as a consummate UN insider, having also worked as head of field operations at UN peacekeeping and in humanitarian affairs at the World Food Programme.
British diplomats at the United Nations have said they did not consider her country's long-standing claim to the Falklands, known in Spanish as Las Malvinas, to be an obstacle to her appointment.
Malcorra made clear in her statement that as UN chief she would keep a neutral stance on the sensitive dispute, for which Britain and Argentina went to war in 1982.
- Make the UN work -
During two hours, the foreign minister answered questions from UN member-states on a range of issues from the fate of refugees to her greatest frustration working 20 years at the United Nations.
"What frustrated me the most? I think that when I knew that something could be done and for some reason got stuck, then that frustrated me," Malcorra said.
"Probably, that is the reason why I am sitting before you here," she added.
"I have the conviction that this organization can go beyond what it has done so far."
The next secretary-general is under pressure from key powers at the United Nations to show that he or she can take the clunky, often sclerotic world body and turn it into a more effective organization.
Malcorra is one of 11 candidates including five women who have thrown their hat in the ring to succeed Ban when he steps down on January 1.
The council is due to begin straw polls to select a nominee in July, but the process is not expected to conclude before October, when the General Assembly will be asked to endorse the council's choice.
For the first time in the UN's 71-year history, the General Assembly is holding hearings with the candidates in a process seen as injecting much-needed transparency.
But the final choice of the next secretary-general is still expected to be the result of a consensus among the five Security Council permanent members -- Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States.