The United Nations Security Council veto power is the power of the five permanent members of the UN Security Council (China, France, Russia, the United Kingdom, and the United States) to veto any decision other than a "procedural" decision.
A permanent member's abstention or absence does not count as a veto. A "procedural" decision (such as changing the meeting agenda or inviting a non-member to sit at a UNSC meeting) also cannot be vetoed.
A veto is a legal power to unilaterally stop an official action. In the most typical case, a president or monarch vetoes a bill to stop it from becoming law. In many countries, veto powers are established in the country's constitution. Veto powers are also found at other levels of government, such as in state, provincial or local government, and in international bodies.
Some vetoes can be overcome, often by a supermajority vote: in the United States, a two-thirds vote of the House and Senate can override a presidential veto. Some vetoes, however, are absolute and cannot be overridden. For example, in the United Nations Security Council, the five permanent members (China, France, Russia, the United Kingdom, and the United States) have an absolute veto over any Security Council resolution.
A United Nations Security Council resolution (UNSCR) is a United Nations resolution adopted by the Security Council (UNSC), the United Nations (UN) 15-member body charged with "primary responsibility for the maintenance of international peace and security".
The UN Charter specifies, in Article 27, that decisions of the Security Council shall be made by an affirmative vote of nine members, out of the 15 members of the Security Council. With the exception of purely procedural decisions, all other resolutions adopted by the Security Council can be vetoed by any of the five permanent members. The five permanent members are the People's Republic of China (which replaced the Republic of China in 1971), France, Russia (which replaced the defunct Soviet Union in 1991), the United Kingdom, and the United States of America.
United Nations General Assembly Resolution 68/262 was adopted on 27 March 2014 by the sixty-eighth session of the United Nations General Assembly in response to the Russian annexation of Crimea and entitled "Territorial integrity of Ukraine". The nonbinding resolution, which was supported by 100 United Nations member states, affirmed the General Assembly's commitment to the territorial integrity of Ukraine within its internationally recognized borders and underscored the invalidity of the 2014 Crimean referendum. Eleven nations voted against the resolution, while 58 abstained, and a further 24 states were absent when the vote took place.
The resolution was introduced by Canada, Costa Rica, Germany, Lithuania, Poland, and Ukraine. The adoption of the resolution was preceded by the unsuccessful attempts of the United Nations Security Council, which convened seven sessions to address the Crimean crisis, only to face a Russian veto of draft resolution S/2014/189, sponsored by 42 countries.
The permanent members of the United Nations Security Council (also known as the Permanent Five, Big Five, or P5) are the five sovereign states to whom the UN Charter of 1945 grants a permanent seat on the UN Security Council: China, France, Russia, United Kingdom, and United States.
The permanent members were all Allies in World War II (and the victors of that war), and are the five states with the first and most nuclear weapons. All have the power of veto, which enables any one of them to prevent the adoption of any "substantive" draft Council resolution, regardless of its level of international support.
United Nations Security Council resolution 1244, adopted on 10 June 1999, after recalling resolutions 1160 (1998), 1199 (1998), 1203 (1998) and 1239 (1999), authorised an international civil and military presence in the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia and established the United Nations Interim Administration Mission in Kosovo (UNMIK). It followed an agreement by Yugoslav President Slobodan Milošević to terms proposed by President of Finland Martti Ahtisaari and former Prime Minister of Russia Viktor Chernomyrdin on 8 June, involving withdrawal of all Yugoslav state forces from Kosovo (Annex 2 of the Resolution). Annex 2 also specified that "After withdrawal, an agreed number of Yugoslav and Serbian personnel will be permitted to return to perform the following functions:· Liaison with the international civil mission and the international security presence;· Marking/clearing minefields;· Maintaining a presence at Serb patrimonial sites;· Maintaining a presence at key border crossings."
Resolution 1244 was adopted by 14 votes in favour to none against. China abstained despite being critical of the NATO offensive, particularly the bombing of its embassy. It argued that the conflict should be settled by the Yugoslav government and its people, and was opposed to external intervention. However, as the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia accepted the peace proposal, China did not veto the resolution.
As of September 2025, the State of Palestine is recognized as a sovereign state by 157 of the 193 member states of the United Nations (UN), or just over 80% of all UN members. It has been a non-member observer state of the UN General Assembly since November 2012. This limited status is largely due to the fact that the United States, a permanent member of the UN Security Council with veto power, has consistently blocked Palestine's full UN membership; Palestine is recognized by the other four permanent members, which are China, France, Russia, and the United Kingdom.
The State of Palestine was officially declared by the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) on 15 November 1988, claiming sovereignty over the internationally recognized Palestinian territories: the West Bank (which includes East Jerusalem) and the Gaza Strip. By the end of 1988, the Palestinian state was recognized by 78 countries. In an attempt to solve the decades-long Israeli–Palestinian conflict, the Oslo Accords were signed between Israel and the PLO in 1993 and 1995, creating the Palestinian Authority (PA) as a self-governing interim administration in Gaza and around 40% of the West Bank.
The United Nations Preventive Deployment Force (UNPREDEP) was established on 31 March 1995 in Security Council Resolution 983 to replace the United Nations Protection Force (UNPROFOR) in the Republic of Macedonia. The mandate of UNPREDEP remained essentially the same: to monitor and report any developments in the border areas which could undermine confidence and stability in the country and threaten its territory. It is widely considered to be an instance of a successful deployment of UN peacekeeping forces in the prevention of conflict and violence against civilians. The operation was shut down on 28 February 1999, after its last extension in Resolution 1186 when China vetoed its renewal in 1999 following Macedonia's diplomatic recognition of Taiwan. This mission was unique as it was the first peacekeeping operation to undertake conflict prevention before the outbreak of conflict. The premature termination of UNPREDEP in 1999 predates the 2001 insurgency in Macedonia.
This is a list of United Nations Security Council Resolutions that have been vetoed by one of the five permanent members of the Security Council since 16 February 1946.