India sought zero tolerance against criminal acts committed by personnel working on UN missions globally, saying such crimes are highly damaging for the image and credibility of the world body.
Addressing a committee meeting of the UN General Assembly, First Secretary at Permanent Mission of India to the UN, Yedla Umasankar said that at a broader level, the issue of accountability has remained elusive in some cases because of the complexities of legal aspects relating to sovereignty and jurisdiction of member states.
Mr. Umasankar said it is unclear whether investigations conducted by the UN may be accepted as evidence in criminal law proceedings in the courts of a member state. He said it appears that the UN system itself may be reluctant to waive immunity even for serious misconduct carried out by its personnel while on its missions, so that such cases can be prosecuted by the host governments.
As such India has asked for data from the world body, including total number of registered cases of serious misconduct committed by UN personnel, total number of cases where the host government asked for waiver of immunity for UN personnel, and total number of cases where the UN refused to waive the immunity of their personnel.