UNITED NATIONS, July 26 (Xinhuanet) -- The Italian ambassador to the United Nations on Tuesday slammed Japan, Germany, India and Brazil, four aspirants to be Security Council permanent members, accusing them of blackmailing other countries to seek support.

    Marcello Spatafora made the outright accusations at an open debate of the 191-nation General Assembly, during which Canada introduced a draft resolution calling for an increase of 10 non-permanent seats of the Security Council.

    The resolution is co-sponsored by 12 countries, including Canada, Italy, Pakistan and Columbia, all member states of the so-called "Uniting for Consensus" (UFC) movement. The group opposes an expansion of the council's permanent membership as sought by Japan, Germany, India and Brazil, known as the G-4.

    In his speech, Spatafora said the G-4 were "resorting to financial leverage and to financial pressures in order to induce a government to align, or not to align, itself with a certain position, or to cosponsor or vote in favor of a certain draft."

    According to Spatafora, a donor country among the G-4 has threatened to halt a 460,000-US dollar development project already in place in a country which cosponsored a resolution.

    "It is a shame," he said. "It is a question of ethics and moral values. It is a question of blackmailing some sectors of the membership. Taking undue advantages from their vital needs. Enough is enough."

    "We have the moral obligation not to allow a reform of the security council to be decided in this unhealthy and poisoned environment," he stressed.

    The G-4 proposes that the number of the Security Council members be expanded to 25 from the current 15 by increasing six permanent members and four rotating elected ones.

    Spatafora said the G-4 model is "structured in such a way as to benefit just six happy few, at the detriment of all the other 180 member states, and with a tremendous divisive impact on the membership."

    While presenting the UFC resolution, Canadian Ambassador Allan Rock said, "Our purpose is not to oppose the aspirants (G-4), but rather to support a principle: that widening the permanent circle for the few who seek special status, no matter how worthy their candidacies, would make the Security Council less accountable for its conduct, more remote from the membership and less representative of the world's regions."

    Adoption of a UN reform proposal by the General Assembly requires the support of two-thirds of the 191 UN member states, or 128 "yes" votes. Enditem