Asian ambassadors in Cairo have been invited by the Egyptian Foreign Ministry to hear why Egypt should be elected a non-permanent member of the UN Security Council in 2016/17, according to the foreign ministry's statement Friday. Foreign ministry assistant for Asian affairs Yasser Murad and assistant for multi-party matters and international security Hisham Badr met with the ambassadors of different Asian countries to present Egypt's vision about regional matters and express Egypt's hope that the Asian countries will support Egypt during the elections for Security Council membership are due to take place in October 2015. Badr explained Egypt's participation in UN peacekeeping missions and expressed Egypt's support for UN organizations for peace in the Middle East and Asia. A similar demand was presented by President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi during his UN speech where he announced that Egypt is aiming to have a non-permanent membership in order to serve and protect the interests of developing countries. Egypt has been seeking to obtain a UN Security Council permanent seat in an effort to increase the representation of the developing countries in the Security Council. Egypt was last member of the Security Council in 1946, 1949-50, 1984-85 and lastly in 1996-97.
