is a skyscraper and the centerpiece of the
Headquarters of the United Nations. The secretary-general is appointed by the
General Assembly upon the recommendation of the
Security Council. As the recommendation must come from the Security Council, any of the five
permanent members of the council can veto a nomination. Most secretaries-general are compromise candidates from
middle powers and have little prior fame. Unofficial qualifications for the job have been set by precedent in previous selections. The appointee may not be a citizen of any of the Security Council's five permanent members. The General Assembly resolution 51/241 in 1997 stated that, in the appointment of "the best candidate", due regard should be given to regional (continental) rotation of the appointee's national origin and to gender equality, although no woman has yet served as secretary-general. All appointees to date have been
career diplomats. incumbent secretary-generals have avoided seeking a third term since the
1981 selection, when China cast a record 16 vetoes against a third term for
Kurt Waldheim. The selection process is opaque and is often compared to a
papal conclave. Since 1981, the Security Council has voted in secret in a series of
straw polls; it then submits the winning candidate to the General Assembly for ratification. No candidate has ever been rejected by the General Assembly, and only once,
in 1950, has a candidate been voted upon despite a UNSC veto. In 2016, the General Assembly and the Security Council sought nominations and conducted public debates for the first time. However, the Security Council voted in private and followed the same process as previous selections, leading the
president of the General Assembly to complain that it "does not live up to the expectations of the membership and the new standard of openness and transparency". ==Powers and duties==