Croatia's two-year nonpermanent membership of the UN Security Council officially ended at midnight on Thursday, when its place was taken by Bosnia-Herzegovina.
Apart from Bosnia-Herzegovina, which was elected to the Security Council asthe representative of Southeast European countries, Brazil, Lebanon, Gabon andNigeria also began a nonpermanent membership on January 1, replacing Libya,Vietnam, Costa Rica and Burkina Faso.
This year, the Security Council will comprise, apart from the five permanentmembers -- the US, Russia, China, Great Britain and France -- Austria, Japan,Mexico, Turkey and Uganda, whose two-year mandate began today.
Croatia was on the UN Security Council from 1 January 2008 to 21 December2009, presiding over it in December 2008, when it put on the agenda adiscussion on terrorism that was chaired by Croatian President Stjepan Mesic.
During its two-year membership, Croatia presided over the council'sCounter-Terrorism Committee, while in 2008, it co-chaired the committee on thenonproliferation of weapons of mass destruction and sanctions committees onSudan and Somalia.
