A/69/PV.29 General Assembly

The General Assembly will now proceed with the election of 15 members of the Human Rights Council to replace those members whose term of office expires on 31 December 2014. The 15 outgoing members are Austria, Benin, Botswana, Burkina Faso, Chile, the Congo, Costa Rica, the Czech Republic, India, Indonesia, Italy, Kuwait, Peru, the Philippines and Romania. In accordance with paragraph 7 of resolution 60/251 of 15 March 2006, those Member States are eligible for immediate re-election, except those that have served two consecutive terms, namely, Burkina Faso and Chile. The 15 vacant seats should be distributed among the regional groups as follows: four seats for the African States; four seats for the Asia-Pacific States; two seats for the Eastern European States; three seats for the Latin American and Caribbean States; and two seats for the Western European and Other States. In accordance with resolution 60/251, membership in the Council shall be open to all States Members of the United Nations, and the members of the Council *1458105* 14-58105 (E) shall serve for a period of three years. The members of the Council shall be elected directly and individually, by secret ballot, by the majority of the members of the General Assembly. Accordingly, 97 votes constitute a majority in the General Assembly, which has a membership of 193 States. In accordance with paragraphs 4 and 5 of resolution 65/281 of 17 June 2011, beginning in 2013 the Human Rights Council will start its yearly membership cycle on 1 January and, as a transitional measure, the period of office of members of the Human Rights Council ending in June 2014 has been exceptionally extended until the end of the calendar year. The following States will continue to be members of the Human Rights Council: Algeria, Argentina, Brazil, China, Côte d’Ivoire, Cuba, Estonia, Ethiopia, France, Gabon, Germany, Ireland, Japan, Kazakhstan, Kenya, Maldives, Mexico, Montenegro, Morocco, Namibia, Pakistan, the Republic of Korea, the Russian Federation, Saudi Arabia, Sierra Leone, South Africa, the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, the United Arab Emirates, the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, the United States of America, the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela and Viet Nam. The names of those States therefore should not appear on the ballot papers. The election will be held in accordance with the relevant rules of procedure of the General Assembly on elections. For this election, rules 92 and 94 of the rules of procedure shall be applied. Consistent with the practice of the General Assembly, if more than the required number of Member States have obtained the votes of the majority of the members of the Assembly on the same ballot, those Member States that have obtained the largest number of votes above the required majority will be considered as elected, up to the number of seats to be filled. Also, consistent with past practice, in case, due to a tie vote, it should become necessary to determine one candidate to be elected or that will proceed to the next round of restricted balloting, there will be a special restricted ballot limited to those candidates that have obtained an equal number of votes. May I take it that the General Assembly agrees to these procedures?

Accordingly, the election shall be held by secret ballot, and there shall be no nominations. Again, I should like to repeat that the 15 vacant seats are to be filled from among the regional groups as follows: four seats from among the African States; four seats from among the Asia-Pacific States; two seats from among the Eastern European States; three seats from among the Latin American and Caribbean States; and two seats from among the Western European and other States. The ballot papers reflect that pattern. In addition, I have been informed by the Secretariat that voluntary pledges and commitments made by Member States in accordance with paragraph 8 of resolution 60/251 were accordingly issued, when received on time before the elections, as official documents of the sixty-ninth session of the General Assembly. Before we begin the voting process, I should like to remind members that, pursuant to rule 88 of the rules of procedure of the General Assembly, no representative shall interrupt the voting except on a point of order on the actual conduct of the voting. In addition, ballot papers will be given only to the representative seated directly behind the country’s nameplate. I should like to seek the usual cooperation of representatives during the time when the General Assembly is conducting the elections. I remind them that during the voting procedure, all campaigning should cease in the General Assembly Hall. That means that, once the meeting has begun, no more campaign material can be distributed inside the Hall. All representatives are also requested to remain at their seats so that the voting process can proceed in an orderly manner. I should also like to remind delegations to refrain from extending congratulations in the General Assembly Hall after the announcement of the elected members. It is disruptive to the distribution of ballot papers for any subsequent rounds of balloting. I thank representatives for their cooperation. I would also like to remind members of the media not to focus their cameras on delegations during the voting process, taking into account that this is a secret ballot in accordance with the rules of procedures of the General Assembly. I thank members of the media for their cooperation. We shall now begin the voting process. Ballot papers marked “A”, “B”, “C”, “D” and “E” will now be distributed. Each ballot paper is assigned to one of the five regional groups and has the corresponding number of blank lines for the seats assigned to that region. I request representatives to use only those ballot papers and to write on them the names of the States for which they wish to vote. A ballot paper containing more names from the relevant region than the number of seats assigned to it will be declared invalid. A ballot will also be declared invalid if all the names of the Member States on that ballot do not belong to the relevant region. If a ballot paper of a region includes both the names of Member States that belong to and that are from outside of that region, the ballot remains valid but only the names of the Member States that belong to the relevant region will be counted. If a ballot paper contains names of Member States that are not eligible for re-election or that are currently members of the Council, the ballot remains valid, but those names will not be counted.

The result of the voting is as follows: Group A — African States Number of ballot papers 192 Number of invalid ballots: 0 Number of valid ballots: 192 Abstentions: 1 Number of members voting: 191 Required absolute majority: 97 Number of votes obtained: Ghana 187 Nigeria 187 Congo 185 Botswana 183 Democratic Republic of the Congo 2 Benin 2 Group B — Asia-Pacific States Number of ballot papers 192 Number of invalid ballots: 0 Number of valid ballots: 192 Abstentions: 0 Number of members voting: 192 Required absolute majority: 97 Number of votes obtained: India 162 Indonesia 152 Bangladesh 149 Qatar 142 Thailand 136 Kuwait 2 Cambodia 1 Philippines 1 Bahrain 1 Group C — Eastern European States Number of ballot papers 192 Number of invalid ballots: 0 Number of valid ballots: 192 Abstentions: 9 Number of members voting: 183 Required absolute majority: 97 Number of votes obtained: Albania 176 Latvia 175 Romania 3 Lithuania 1 Czech Republic 1 Group D — Latin American and Caribbean States Number of ballot papers 192 Number of invalid ballots: 0 Number of valid ballots: 192 Abstentions: 0 Number of members voting: 192 Required absolute majority: 97 Number of votes obtained: El Salvador 151 Bolivia (Plurinational State of) 144 Paraguay 139 Costa Rica 120 Peru 2 Group E — Western European and Other States Number of ballot papers 192 Number of invalid ballots: 0 Number of valid ballots: 192 Abstentions: 6 Number of members voting: 186 Required absolute majority: 97 Number of votes obtained: Portugal 184 Netherlands 172 Italy 1 Greece 1

I congratulate those States that have been elected members of the Human Rights Council, and I thank the tellers for their assistance in this election. The General Assembly has thus concluded its consideration of sub-item (c) of agenda item 112.