United Nations Regional Groups
The member states of the United Nations are unofficially divided into five geopolitical regional groups. What began as an informal means of sharing the distribution of posts for General Assembly committees has taken on a much more expansive role. Depending on the UN context, regional groups control elections to UN-related positions, dividing up the pie on the basis of geographic representation, as well as coordinate substantive policy, and form common fronts for negotiations and voting.
As of July 2011, the 193 UN member states are divided into five groups:
- the African Group, with 54 member states.
- the Asia-Pacific Group, with 53 member states;
- the Eastern European Group, with 23 member states;
- the Latin American and Caribbean Group (GRULAC), with 33 member states;
- the Western European and Others Group (WEOG), with 28 member states, plus 1 member state as observer.
Kiribati is not included in the above numbers (see below).
Read more about United Nations Regional Groups: Overview Table, Gallery, Criticisms
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