United States President Joe Biden called for reforms in the United Nations on Wednesday in an address to the global intergovernmental organisation, shortly after accusing Russia of violating the UN charter. 

In his speech, Biden said that Russian President Vladimir Putin’s move to invade Ukraine because of threats to national security was inaccurate because “no one other than Russia sought conflict.”

The 79-year-old said that Russia had attempted to “erase the sovereign state from the map,” referencing Ukraine. 

In response to Biden’s call for reforms, several countries have backed the US. One of the reforms that the US President spoke about was the expansion of the UN Security Council, considering that permanent members were using their veto powers on a regular basis. 

Ukraine’s President Vlodymyr Zelenskyy tuned in for the General Assembly meeting calling for reforms to the UNSC as well, saying that many countries across Asia, Africa, Latin America and Central and Eastern Europe have “comply with the right to veto, that they never had.”

“We need a representative, agile and functional security council that can respond to the challenges of the 21st century without becoming paralysed, and whose actions are scrutinized by other members of the United Nations,” said Portugal’s Prime Minister António Costa in his address to the annual session of the General Assembly. 

Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida stressed the importance of reforming the UN as well as the powerful security council saying that it needed to “return to the vision and principles of the UN Charter, with the strengthening of the UN’s functions, including disarmament and non-proliferation.”

Germany’s Chancellor Olaf Scholz who replaced Angela Merkel last December said that his country had been committed to reforming the UN while mentioning the importance of including the global south in the UNSC. Scholz mentioned that countries in the regions of Asia, Africa and South America “must be given a stronger political voice on the world stage.”