The United Nations Security Council is one of the six principal organs of the United Nations, and is the United Nations' executive branch, having primary responsibility for the maintenance of international peace and security. Its powers, outlined in the UN Charter, include establishing peacekeeping operations, authorizing military action, and imposing international sanctions. Under Chapter VII of the UN Charter, the council may identify threats to international peace, determine breaches of that peace, and authorize responses up to and including the use of force. It is the only UN body with the authority to adopt binding international law by issuing resolutions binding on all member states. The council also recommends the admission of new member states to the UN General Assembly, and approves changes to the Charter. It is led by the president of the Security Council, who chairs its meetings and rotates between the current members on a monthly basis and the United Nations secretary-general who acts as its executive officer overseeing the implementation of its decisions and mandates. The United Nations secretary-general is empowered by the UN Charter to "bring to the attention of the Security Council any matter which in his opinion may threaten the maintenance of international peace and security".
The Security Council consists of 15 members: five permanent members – Russia, China, the United States, the United Kingdom, and France – and ten non-permanent members elected by the General Assembly for two-year terms. The five permanent members, who were the great powers among the Allies of World War II or their recognized successor states, each hold veto power over substantive resolutions, enabling any one of them to block adoption of a draft resolution regardless of the level of support among other members. This veto right does not carry over into General Assembly matters or votes, which are non-binding. The presidency rotates monthly among all fifteen members in English alphabetical order.
Created in 1945 after World War II to succeed the League of Nations in maintaining international order, the council held its first session on 17 January 1946 at Church House, Westminster, in London. During the Cold War, it was largely paralyzed by rivalry between the United States and the Soviet Union, though it authorized interventions in the Korean War and the Congo Crisis and deployed peacekeepers to Cyprus and the Sinai Peninsula. Following the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991, peacekeeping expanded dramatically: the council authorized major operations in Kuwait, Namibia, Cambodia, Bosnia, and Somalia, among others. In the 2020s, the council has faced renewed paralysis, with repeated vetoes by Russia over the war in Ukraine and by the United States over the war in Gaza, prompting fresh calls for structural reform.
