On Friday, 21 August, the UN Security Council conducted its second straw poll, indicating the level of support among its members for each Secretary-General candidate.

The 15 members of the Security Council vote ‘encourage’, ‘discourage’ or ‘no opinion’ on their ballot for the candidates. In this second poll, the votes of the Permanent Five veto-holding members of the council remain undifferentiated from those of the other elected members.

Carolyn Rodrigues Birkett took the lead with 8 ‘encourage’ votes. Rebeca Grynspan — who had come first in last month’s straw poll — placed second with 7 ‘encourage’ votes. Rafael Grossi was a close third, securing the same 7 ‘encourage’ votes as Grynspan, but a higher number of ‘discourage’ votes (6 ‘discourages’ to Grynspan’s 4).

The vote took place shortly after the two most recently nominated candidates, Ivonne A-Baki and Olara Otunnu, participated in General Assembly interactive dialogues on 19 and 20 August.

Find the full results of the straw polls here.

As in the 2016 process, the straw poll result was not publicly released or formally transmitted to the PGA; however, the results have been leaked online. You can find out more about how the Security Council straw polls work in our Ultimate Guide to the Selection Process.