Pakistan Wins Seat On UN Security Council

Pakistani Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani Khar addresses the UN's 66th General Assembly in September 2011.

UNITED NATIONS -- Pakistan has been elected as a nonpermanent member of the United Nations Security Council for a two-year term beginning in January.

Pakistan secured the two-thirds majority required from the 193 UN members in the first round of voting.

It is the seventh two-year Security Council mandate for Pakistan, a veteran UN member state which is the second-largest contributor to UN peacekeeping forces.

The campaign also marked the first formal bid for a Security Council seat by Kyrgyzstan, even though that Central Asian country declared aspirations for a seat as far back as 1997.

Morocco and Guatemala also won seats on the 15-member council.

A second round of voting was required in a race between Azerbaijan, Slovenia, and Hungary for the seat being vacated by Bosnia-Herzegovina at the end of the year.