NAIROBI: The UN must be reformed to increase African representation, Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said on Monday when he broke ground on an expansion of the UN’s Kenyan campus.
Guterres has repeatedly called over the years for change to give Africa and other regions better representation at the UN.
But this request has made little progress since it requires the five permanent Security Council members — Britain, China, France, Russia and the US — to agree to dilute their own power.
“We need deeper reforms of ... global institutions that reflect the world as it is today, not as it was 80 years ago, and this includes the Security Council, where a historic injustice persists in denying Africa permanent seats,” Guterres told reporters.
Asked for a realistic roadmap toward Security Council reform, Guterres said it would be “difficult.”
“But there are some steps already in the right direction,” he said.
He pointed to efforts by Britain and France to limit the use of the veto by permanent members on the Security Council in extreme situations like genocide.
“It’s important to say that reform is absolutely necessary, because with the geopolitical divides we are witnessing, to secure peace and security in the present world is becoming extremely, extremely difficult and we need an effective Security Council,” Guterres said.
His comments came as French and Kenyan foreign affairs officials also discussed reform of the Security Council.
They were meeting on the sidelines of a two-day summit co-hosted by France and Kenya to bring together African leaders and business executives.
Guterres was in Kenya to break ground on a $340 million expansion of the UN’s Nairobi campus — part of efforts to cut costs by moving staff from its New York and Geneva offices.
“It is a cheaper location than others ... It’s good business for the UN,” Guterres said. The campus began as a regional hub for the UN’s environmental and housing arms but has grown to house more than 80 of its offices and more than 4,000 staff.
Washington has severely cut contributions to the UN under President Donald Trump — especially related to humanitarian aid — and threatened more cuts, putting adding pressure on the organization to cut costs.
Meanwhile, French President Emmanuel Macron said on Monday the process of returning African artworks looted during the colonial era had become “unstoppable.”
He was speaking in Nairobi, just days after the French parliament unanimously passed a law paving the way for Macron to return looted African cultural artefacts.
France holds tens of thousands of artworks and other prized artifacts that it looted from the continent during its colonial empire.
Macron pledged to young Africans, during a speech in Burkina Faso in 2017, to facilitate the return of the stolen works within five years.
“I believe we have built something irreversible and unstoppable,” Macron said on Monday.
He criticized opponents of the law, insisting it was “about repentance.”
“Even if someone came to power in France who wanted to roll back restitutions, I don’t think they would succeed ... not even all those who are stirring up ill winds and want to retreat into themselves,” he added.
Other former colonial powers in Europe have slowly moved to return artworks acquired during imperial rule but France has been hindered by legislation requiring each item to be approved through a separate vote.
Despite a growing number of restitution requests, France has returned only a handful of artefacts to its colonies.
The law approved last week allows the government in Paris to return works of art without having to resort to passing piecemeal legislation.
In 2025, France’s parliament approved the return to Ivory Coast of a talking drum that colonial troops took from the Ebrie tribe in 1916. It was returned in March.
“This is the beginning of an exchange,” Macron said.
