Por­tu­gal and Aus­tria de­feat­ed Ger­many for seats on the pow­er­ful but deeply di­vid­ed U.N. Se­cu­ri­ty Coun­cil on Wednes­day in a hot­ly con­test­ed race af­ter in­tense cam­paign­ing.

The 10 ro­tat­ing seats on the 15-mem­ber Se­cu­ri­ty Coun­cil are ear­marked for dif­fer­ent re­gions of the world. The as­sem­bly elects five coun­tries by se­cret bal­lot every year to serve two-year terms along­side the coun­cil’s five per­ma­nent ve­to-wield­ing mem­bers — the Unit­ed States, Rus­sia, Chi­na, Britain and France.

In the oth­er con­test­ed race, af­ter four rounds of vot­ing in the 193-mem­ber Gen­er­al As­sem­bly, Kyr­gyzs­tan de­feat­ed the Philip­pines by a vote of 143-49 and will join the coun­cil for the first time.