The Ugandan government has officially nominated former Ugandan Foreign Minister Olara Otunnu as a candidate for the next UN secretary-general.

With this nomination, the total number of candidates endorsed by governments for the upcoming UN secretary-general has risen to seven.

According to local media outlet The Independent, Reuters, and AFP on the 27th local time, Bagiire Vincent Waiswa, permanent secretary at the Ugandan Ministry of Foreign Affairs, announced the official nomination in a statement the previous day.

The Ugandan government introduced Otunnu as an exceptional international public servant with over 40 years of experience in diplomacy, peacebuilding, and international governance.

Otunnu served as UN under-secretary-general and special representative for children and armed conflict from 1997 to 2005 during the tenure of former UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan.

The Ugandan government noted that during his tenure, the Monitoring and Reporting Mechanism (MRM) was launched in 2005 under UN Security Council Resolution 1612 to monitor and report on grave violations of children's rights, which continues to serve as a standard for the international community's child protection efforts.

Before joining the UN Secretariat, Otunnu served as Uganda's permanent representative to the UN from 1980 to 1985 and as foreign minister from 1985 to 1986.

He also ran as an opposition presidential candidate for the Uganda Peoples Congress (UPC) in 2011, but was defeated by President Yoweri Museveni, who has been in power since 1986.

With Otunnu's entry, the officially declared candidates for the UN secretary-general currently consist of five from Latin America and two from Africa.

With four female candidates in the running, attention is also focused on whether the UN will produce its first female secretary-general.

The current contenders include former Chilean President Michelle Bachelet, former Ecuadorian Foreign Minister Maria Fernanda Espinosa, Rafael Grossi of Argentina, director-general of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA); Rebeca Grynspan of Costa Rica, secretary-general of the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD); Carolyn Rodrigues-Birkett, Guyana's permanent representative to the UN; and former Senegalese President Macky Sall.

Additional candidate registrations may take place.

(Photo: AP, Yonhap News)