Over 600 MPs support call for UN Parliamentary Assembly

4. February 2009

More than 600 Members of Parliament from over 90 countries now endorse the appeal for the establishment of a United Nations Parliamentary Assembly (UNPA). "Over the past six months over 100 further elected representatives have joined our call", the campaign's international Secretariat in Berlin announced today. The 600th Member of Parliament who signed the appeal was Senator Tadashi Inuzuka, a member of the House of Councillors in the Japanese Diet (in the picture). "The establishment of a United Nations Parliamentary Assembly is an important and highly topical issue. I hope that it will gather even more support in the near future," Senator Inuzuka commented the occasion.

The Head of the campaign's Secretariat, Andreas Bummel, pointed out that "the parliamentarians who endorse this campaign democratically represent more than 100 million people from their constituencies around the world." According to the campaign, a UNPA would be "a unique hinge between local constituencies, parliaments, civil society, the UN system and governments." As such, its proponents argue, the body could become an "important catalyst for global change" and would facilitate "a reform of the present system of global institutions and governance."