United Nations - Review of the French presidency of the Security Council (June 2020)

Succeeding Estonia and preceding Germany as part of a “European trimester,” France held the presidency of the UN Security Council during the month of June 2020.

Under the French presidency, the Security Council debated the consequences of the Covid-19 pandemic on maintaining international peace and security and on all crises and conflict situations. A Security Council meeting on June 4 was notably devoted to the efforts of peacekeepers in the current health context. France also hosted a meeting on June 18 involving Filippo Grandi, UN High Commissioner for Refugees, devoted to the impact of the pandemic on refugees and internally displaced persons and aimed at supporting the implementation of the COVID-19 Global Humanitarian Response Plan.

Throughout June, France and Tunisia continued their efforts to adopt a Security Council resolution, for which they had taken the initiative, in order to support the UN secretary-general’s call for a ceasefire and humanitarian truce. These efforts culminated in the unanimous adoption of UNSCR 2532 on July 1.

Minister for Europe and Foreign Affairs Jean-Yves Le Drian chaired, on June 11, a ministerial meeting of the Security Council, which demonstrated a high degree of convergence between member states with respect to the priorities for action in Mali and the Sahel. As a result of these efforts, the Security Council unanimously renewed for one year the mandate of the peacekeeping operation deployed in Mali, MINUSMA.
The minister for Europe and foreign affairs also presided over, on June 26, the commemoration to mark the 75th anniversary of the signing of the UN Charter. He reaffirmed our attachment to multilateralism and the organization’s three pillars, namely peace and security, human rights and sustainable development. The same day, the minister also co-chaired together with his German counterpart, Heiko Maas, a meeting of the Alliance for Multilateralism devoted to the reform of the architecture for health and the fight against infodemics.