Mexico will keep supporting Bachelet for UN chief, president says

MEXICO CITY, March 25 (Reuters) – Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum said on Wednesday her country will continue to support former Chilean President Michelle Bachelet’s candidacy for U.N. secretary-general after Chile withdrew its support the day before.

Sheinbaum said she would soon speak by phone with the two-time president, whose nomination was put forward by the governments of Mexico, Brazil and Chile prior to the swearing in of right-wing Chilean President Jose Antonio Kast this month.

“We believe that Bachelet is the ideal person to lead the United Nations, and we will continue to support her,” Sheinbaum told a daily news conference.

Bachelet served as Chile’s first female head of state and is now among the main candidates to succeed Secretary-General Antonio Guterres.

She served as U.N. high commissioner for human rights from 2018 to 2022 and ​executive director of U.N. Women from 2010 to 2013.

Bachelet said on Tuesday she would continue her candidacy with support from Mexico and from Brazil, which has yet to comment on Chile’s decision. Brazilian officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the country plans to maintain its support for Bachelet.

“She is a woman who seeks peace in the world, who has a vision for building rights, for the peaceful resolution of conflicts, for rebuilding the U.N. as an organization dedicated to resolving international conflicts, and establishing a bill of rights for all the people in the world,” Sheinbaum said.

Chile said on Tuesday it will abstain from supporting any candidate after it withdrew its support for Bachelet, whose candidacy Kast said his predecessor, the left-wing Gabriel Boric, should not have supported.

(Reporting by Sarah Morland and Aida Pelaez-Fernandez; Additional reporting by Lisandra Paraguassu in Brasilia; Editing by Iñigo Alexander, Will Dunham and Daina Beth Solomon)