Grynspan strengthens lead in UN chief race as Turkey’s late entrant struggles

• Costa Rica’s Rebeca Grynspan leads the latest UN leadership straw poll with 12 positive votes and three negative votes

• Turkey’s Feridun Sinirlioglu finishes sixth among eight candidates in his first appearance in the contest

• Permanent members’ veto powers remain decisive as the Security Council seeks a successor to António Guterres

Costa Rica’s Rebeca Grynspan has strengthened her lead in the race to become the next United Nations secretary-general, while Turkey’s late entrant, Feridun Sinirlioglu, finished sixth among eight candidates in the latest Security Council straw poll.

Grynspan, who heads the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development, received 12 positive votes and three negative votes in Thursday’s ballot. Her negative tally fell by one compared with the previous poll in October.

Sinirlioglu, nominated by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan over the weekend, secured three positive votes and eight negative votes in his first appearance in the polling process. He currently serves as secretary-general of the 57-member Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe.

The Council has less than two months to settle on a successor to António Guterres, with the next secretary-general due to take office on 1 January. Its recommendation will go to the General Assembly for approval, which is ordinarily a formality.

The decisive hurdle remains agreement among the Council’s five permanent members, each of which can veto a candidate.

Grynspan has topped seven of the eight straw polls held so far. However, Thursday’s ballots did not distinguish permanent members’ votes from those of elected members, leaving uncertainty over whether she could secure the necessary backing.

In the sixth poll last month, the only ballot to use colour coding to identify permanent members’ votes, Grynspan received two negative votes from that group.

Argentina’s Rafael Grossi, director-general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, remained in second place with nine positive votes, four negative votes and two expressions of no opinion.

Guyana’s former foreign minister, Carolyn Rodrigues-Birkett, placed third with eight positive votes, five negative votes and two neutral responses.

The United Arab Emirates’ minister of state for foreign affairs, Lana Nusseibeh, retained fourth place. Her tally was unchanged from her first poll last month: seven positive votes, six negative votes and two neutral responses.

Turkey entered Sinirlioglu into the contest after its regional rival, the UAE, nominated Nusseibeh.

Uganda’s former foreign minister and former UN under-secretary-general, Olara Otunnu, finished fifth. María Fernanda Espinosa, a former General Assembly president and Ecuadorian foreign minister, ranked seventh, while Ecuador’s former ambassador to Washington, Ivonne A-Baki, came last.

The informal polls allow Council members to mark candidates as “encourage”, “discourage” or “no opinion”, indicating support, opposition or neutrality.

Latvia’s permanent representative, Sanita Pavluta-Deslandes, who holds the Council presidency this month, did not disclose the results, in line with the process’s ground rules. The tallies were subsequently leaked to UN-focused outlets PassBlue and 1for8Billion.

Thursday’s poll was held ahead of Sinirlioglu’s scheduled appearance at a General Assembly dialogue on Friday. The Assembly has insisted that candidates attend these sessions to explain their priorities and answer questions from member states and civil society.

The contest comes amid renewed calls for the UN to appoint its first woman secretary-general after eight decades under nine male leaders. Several national leaders backed that demand during September’s high-level General Assembly meeting.

Latin American and Caribbean countries have also argued that the next secretary-general should come from their region, which last held the post when Javier Pérez de Cuéllar’s tenure ended in 1991. The three leading candidates in the latest poll are all from the region.

With IANS inputs