Ex-Portuguese PM on course to become next UN chief

Israel’s envoy welcomes Antonio Guterres pick, hopes it signals end of world body’s ‘obsession’ with Jewish state

Portugal’s former prime minister Antonio Guterres was poised to become the next secretary-general of the United Nations following a sixth straw poll by the Security Council, diplomats said Wednesday.

Russian Ambassador Vitaly Churkin told reporters that Guterres was the “clear favorite” and announced a formal vote by the council on Thursday to confirm the choice of nominee.

Guterres, who would succeed current general secretary Ban Ki-moon on January 1, served as Socialist prime minister of Portugal from 1995 to 2002. He was president of the European Council from January to July 2000 and United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees between June 2005 and December 2015.

Israel’s Ambassador to the UN Danny Danon on Wednesday welcomed Guterres’s likely nomination, saying Israel hoped and expected that the UN under his leadership would “act in the spirit of its founding principles as a fair body able to differentiate between good and evil” and would “end its obsession with Israel.”

“I hope that this change in leadership will bring an end to the organization’s hostility towards the Jewish state,” he added.

Israel’s UN Ambassador Danny Danon in April 2016 (Albin Lohr-Jones/Pacific Press/LightRocket via Getty Images/JTA)

Danon called on the next general secretary to appoint a special envoy to combat anti-Semitism.

He also said he expected the UN to take responsibility for ensuring the return of the bodies of IDF soldiers Hadar Goldin and Oron Shaul, who fell during the 2014 Gaza war and whose remains are being held by the Hamas terror group.

According to the UN Charter, the secretary-general is chosen by the 193-member General Assembly on the recommendation of the Security Council. In practice, this has meant that the council’s five permanent members — the US, Russia, China, Britain and France — have veto power over the candidates.

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon addressing the UN annual General Assembly, September 20, 2016 (Screen capture: UN Web TV)

By tradition, the job of secretary-general has rotated among regions and Asia, Africa, Latin America and Europe have all held the top post. East European nations, including Russia, argue that they have never had a secretary-general and it is their turn. There has also never been a woman secretary-general and a group of 56 nations are campaigning for the first female UN chief.