UNESCO Director-General election still undecided after round 1

The first round of voting to elect a new UNESCO Director-General took place with surprising results beyond international public opinion's expectations.

The vote to elect the new Director-General of UNESCO took place in the late afternoon of October 9, at UNESCO headquarters in Paris, France. Qatari candidate Hammad bin Al-Kawari won the highest number of votes (19 votes), followed by French candidate Audrey Azoulay (13 votes) and Egyptian candidate Moushira Khattab (11 votes).

UNESCO headquarters in Paris, France. Photo: AP

Thus, no candidate achieved a majority (30/58 votes) and the Executive Council will continue to vote in the second round at the end of the meeting on the afternoon of October 10.

According to many experts, the results of the first round do not reflect the actual situation but are only a preliminary round between countries. In reality, the selection of the Director General of UNESCO, an important organization of the United Nations, is a fierce competition between countries nominating candidates, even between regions. The competition with the final result has happened in the previous election of the Director General of UNESCO.

On the Vietnamese side, the candidate is Ambassador Pham Sanh Chau, who is knowledgeable and has a lot of experience working at UNESCO. He has held the position of Ambassador, Head of the Permanent Delegation of Vietnam to UNESCO and is currently the Prime Minister's special envoy on UNESCO's work.

Facing other "heavyweight" candidates, Vietnam encountered some difficulties, especially when this was the first time Vietnam ran for a position as head of a high-level organization in the United Nations system and had to compete directly.

However, this is a normal activity in international relations, especially when the Asia-Pacific region alone has two candidates, and this is also the region that has had someone holding the position of Director-General of UNESCO. Meanwhile, there are up to four candidates from the Arab region, a region that has never had a candidate elected to the position of Director-General of UNESCO.

Because there are many candidates running for election, the campaigning process as well as the trade-offs and intertwining of interests between countries are quite complicated and challenging.

Although the Vietnamese candidate did not get a high number of votes in the first round of elections, only 2 votes, equal to the number of votes of Azerbaijan, while China got 5 votes and Lebanon 6 votes, through the election campaign, Vietnam has also "reaped" many positive results.

This is reflected in the enhanced position and role of Vietnam in the international arena, as countries highly appreciate Vietnam's proactive and active contributions to the common work of UNESCO.

Bilateral relations and cooperation have been promoted between Vietnam and other countries in the world, especially major countries, countries with strategic cooperative partnerships, comprehensive partners, and traditional friends of Vietnam. Vietnam has demonstrated seriousness, responsibility, and proactive participation in common work in the international arena./.

According to VOV