Declaration of the Andean Council of Presidents on the Reform of the United Nations System

The Presidents of the Member Countries of the Andean Community meeting in Lima on July 18, 2005 on the occasion of the Sixteenth Meeting of the Andean Council of Presidents:

Agreed that the reform of the United Nations System should be comprehensive and balanced and responding to the principles of legitimacy, democracy and effectiveness, insuring the strengthening of multilateralism and the respect of International Law.

The Presidents share the belief that the reform of the Security Council should not be limited to the decision on the expansion of its membership, but to the substantive consideration of the rules for the use of the right to veto.

At the same time, the Presidents consider of essential importance that the reform of the economic and social organizations should allow revaluing the agenda of the United Nations on topics of economic and social development, and specially, on those associated with the fulfillment of the Millennium Goals for reducing poverty, inequality and exclusion.

The Presidents reaffirm their commitment to the unrestricted respect for human rights and, therefore, reiterate their common intention that the reform of the Commission of Human Rights will allow its depoliticization and an effective protection of civil, political, social and economic rights.

The Presidents decide to commission their Foreign Affairs Ministers to promptly coordinate the development of common actions within their wide scope of coincidence in the reform process of the United Nations