Section 3. Strengthening of the United Nations and Japan's Cooperation
Japan has consistently attached importance to cooperation with the United Nations in postwar years as a major pillar of its diplomatic policy and had been promoting international cooperation with various countries through the United Nations.
Through these years, the number of U.N. member countries has increased to 132, and the United Nations has grown into a truly universal international organization composed of almost all countries of the world. Problems that are taken up by the United Nations now cover all fields of human activities, ranging from the maintenance of international peace and security to the problems of outer space and the environment and the exploitation and uses of the seabed and the ocean floor, the last frontier left to mankind. The United Nations is not an international organization that handles only political problems, but a forum that discusses every aspect of international society as well as an organization that carries out international activities. The United Nations as an overall international organization aimed at strengthening international social solidarity plays an increasingly important role as a result of development of close and diversified international relations. Japan needs to make even more positive use of the United Nations as an important arena to carry out its diplomacy, which is expected to take on more and more varied activities, while keeping in mind these recent developments in the United Nations.
Unfortunately, it is a fact that, even after a lapse of more than a quarter of a century since its establishment, the United Nations does not fully meet the expectations of the peoples of the world in performing its functions. In order that the United Nations may perform its functions effectively in coping with changes in the international community in the past quarter of a century, it is important to strengthen the structural and functional aspects of the United Nations so that it can fully reflect such changes. Japan is determined to continue making efforts in that direction.