GENEVA (chinaview) -- Swiss Foreign Minister Micheline Calmy-Rey said on Monday that Switzerland should try to get a seat in the UN Security Council in order to have a stronger international political role.

Addressing the annual conference of Swiss ambassadors in Bern, Calmy-rey also defended her position of "active" Swiss neutrality, Swiss Radio International reported.

"Switzerland doesn't have the critical mass to resolve crises on its own," she said. "Without influence in the Security Council, the necessary financial means or sufficient manpower, our voice is not properly heard during the resolution of ... international crises." She added that a Swiss seat in the Security Council would be a "fruitful" step forward, as it would strengthen the weight and expertise of the Foreign Ministry and "improve decision-making within government."

Calmy-Rey also hit out at Switzerland's current foreign policy, which she said "lacked visibility" and was limited by its own working "framework", its lack of multilateral experience and the limited role of Swiss military abroad. "Our destiny is increasingly dependent on what happens abroad," she told the diplomats. "We are closely bound up with the process of globalization and cannot claim to organize ourselves independently."

In her speech, Calmy-Rey called for stronger Swiss support for international peacekeeping operations, revealing that the foreign and defense ministries had recently presented a more ambitious strategy to the government.

"Reinforcing our commitment to peacekeeping operations would increase our (political) weight in decision-making bodies," she said.

Calmy-Rey emphasized the long way the international community still had to go before becoming a community of states governed by law, citing Iraq, Lebanon, and Sudan as examples of "powerlessness".

"We should rightly ask ourselves whether our support for the rule of law, given its ineffectiveness, is affecting our very own credibility," she said.

Calmy-Rey also lambasted the United States and the European Union on the Lebanon issue.

"Worldwide, everyone is waiting for Europe. Unfortunately the EU is not assuming the place and role that is expected," she commented.

Last week the Swiss Foreign Ministry did not exclude Swiss participation in the UN peacekeeping force in Lebanon, including the sending of troops.