UN Security Council Adopts Pakistan-Led Call for Diplomacy During Wars

Photo: Dawn

The UN Security Council has adopted a statement led by Pakistan that asks countries to keep talking even after wars begin. The statement, agreed by consensus on Thursday, says diplomacy must not stop when the fighting starts, and it calls for ceasefires, de-escalation and lasting political settlements.

The statement is titled "The Role of Diplomacy during Active Hostilities". It was initiated by Pakistan and adopted under the Council's November presidency, held by Latvia's Ambassador Sanita Pavluta-Deslandes. Pakistan's Permanent Representative to the UN, Ambassador Syed Haider Shah, welcomed the adoption and called it an important contribution to efforts to settle conflicts peacefully.

What the Council agreed is simple to say and hard to do. Once a war has broken out, countries should still keep diplomatic channels open, use mediation and the UN Secretary-General's good offices, and talk directly or through backchannels, so that ceasefires become possible and wars do not spread. The point, the statement says, is to protect civilians, contain the violence, stop conflicts from spilling across borders and let humanitarian aid reach people caught in the middle.

Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Ishaq Dar, who announced the adoption, put it in one line. "When hostilities intensify, diplomacy must not retreat," he said.

A presidential statement is not a resolution. It does not order anyone to do anything, and it is not binding. It is the Council speaking with one voice, and its weight comes from the fact that all fifteen members agreed to it. That is why Pakistan pushed for it: a shared text that every member can be held to later, when the next crisis comes.

The statement builds on Resolution 2788, which the Council adopted unanimously in July 2025, during Pakistan's own presidency of the Council, on the peaceful settlement of disputes under the UN Charter. Thursday's text takes that idea one step further, into the hardest case of all: diplomacy while the guns are still firing.

It lands at a crowded moment. The Council is seized with the war around Iran, where President Trump has warned the United States may have to destroy what is left of Iran, and where Russia's President Putin has offered to help end the war. Pakistan's own diplomacy has been busy on the same front, with Turkiye's parliament ratifying the Mecca defence pact with Pakistan and Saudi Arabia earlier today. The new statement gives Islamabad a text to point to in all of those conversations.

Pakistan is serving a two-year elected term on the Security Council for 2025 and 2026, and this is the kind of thematic work it has used the seat for: not one crisis or one country, but a rule the Council can use in every war.

Sources

• Dawn: UN Security Council adopts Pakistan-led statement urging diplomacy during wars
• Dunya News: UNSC adopts Pakistan-led statement urging diplomacy during conflicts
• The Express Tribune: UNSC backs call for wartime diplomacy

Pakistan will keep pushing the same message at the Council through the rest of its term, which runs to the end of 2026.

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