© Reuters/Amr AlfikyFrench envoy Francois Delattre in UN Security Council session.
The suggestion for France to transform its UNSC membership into a joint EU seat came from Germany's Finance Minister Olaf Scholz. "This will take some convincing in Paris," he said on Wednesday, "but it would be a bold and smart goal." In exchange for converting its UN Security Council seat into a collective EU seat, France will get to choose "the EU representative to the UN," the German official added.
Alongside the US, Russia, China and the UK, France is a permanent UNSC member nation with veto power.
It is not entirely clear how serious Olaf Scholz, who also serves as vice chancellor, was about his proposal, but his words caused a stir in the French media. The head of the left-wing La France Insoumise party, Jean-Luc Melenchon, said remodeling of the French seat was "unacceptable." Political strategist Charlotte Girard branded the idea coming from Berlin a "gross annexation" of France's UN status.
The French envoy to the US, Gerard Araud argued that it would be "politically impossible" to alter his nation's seat in favor of a wider EU representation. The Foreign Ministry followed up on Thursday, saying that the French diplomats are already working at the UN "in coordination" with the EU.
They noted, however, that Paris supports Germany getting its own permanent UNSC seat.
German politicians have been pushing for a wider role for the EU at the UN in the past. Back in June, Chancellor Angela Merkel spoke in favor of transforming the non-permanent seats of European countries in the UNSC into "European seats."
Lumping all Europeans together "in one concept and one mechanism" is "nearly impossible," Alexandre Adler, a Paris-based political analyst told RT.
The EU is experiencing several intense internal struggles and rifts between various member states over a wide range of issues, from migration and austerity to anti-Russian sanctions.
This is why a 'shared' EU representation at high political levels can't be "created solely by the dialogue between Germany and France," Adler argues. And doing so without making "necessary concessions" to other EU nations "is a sure recipe for disaster," he said.
Comment: As only individual countries are seated, UNSC would have to vote and approve new rules to accommodate a seat for 'a collective' EU and that is unlikely to happen.