Russia and the United Nations
  |
|
| United Nations membership | |
|---|---|
| Membership | Full member |
| Since |
1945 (as USSR) 1992 (as Russia) |
| Former name(s) | Soviet Union |
| UNSC seat | Permanent |
| Ambassador | Pyotr Ilichov (Acting) |
Russia succeeded the Soviet Union's seat, including its permanent membership on the Security Council in the United Nations after the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991. The succession was supported by the USSR's former members and was not objected to by the UN membership; Russia accounted for about half the Soviet Union's economy and most of its land mass; in addition, the history of the Soviet Union began in Russia. If there was to be a successor to the Soviet seat on the Security Council among the former Soviet republics, these factors made Russia seem like a logical choice. Nonetheless, due to the rather inflexible wording of the United Nations Charter and its lack of provision for succession, the succession's technical legality has been questioned by some international lawyers.
Chapter V, Article 23 of the UN Charter, adopted in 1945, provides that "The Security Council should consist of fifteen Members of the United Nations. The Republic of China, The French Republic, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, and the United States of America shall be permanent members of the Security Council."
The USSR collapsed in late 1991. Eleven of the twelve members of the Commonwealth of Independent States signed a declaration on December 21, 1991, agreeing that "Member states of the Commonwealth support Russia in taking over the USSR membership in the UN, including permanent membership in the Security Council." One day before the resignation of Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev, Ambassador Y. Vorontsov transmitted to the UN Secretary-General Javier Pérez de Cuéllar a letter from President of the Russian Federation Boris Yeltsin stating that:
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