Guyanese ex-foreign minister Carolyn Rodrigues-Birkett narrowly led the second round of the informal process to pick the next UN chief, a diplomatic source and specialist media said Friday.
She dipped slightly to second place, while Argentina’s Rafael Grossi, the current head of the UN nuclear watchdog, came in third, according to the diplomatic source and specialist publication Pass Blue. Denmark’s UN ambassador Christina Lassen, whose country holds the Council’s rotating presidency, said the body was considering the timing of the next straw poll. “It’s too early to have a consensus,” said council-member Democratic Republic of Congo’s ambassador Zenon Ngay Mukongo after the vote. International Crisis Group’s Daniel Forti said earlier that the veto-wielding nations Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States might wait until later to express their preferences, while new contenders could emerge. Russia’s ambassador to the UN, Vassily Nebenzia, said Thursday he could not rule out that possibility. “If, for example I’m speculating now if there is a deadlock on any of the candidates we are seeing today, if nobody… flies, then I think that we may see other candidates as well,” Nebenzia said. Each member state must anonymously assign each candidate one of three labels: “encourage,” “discourage,” or “no opinion. Rodrigues received eight votes of encouragement, three of discouragement, and four of no opinion, according to the diplomatic source.
