1981 United Nations Secretary-General selection straw polls, an innovation that became the standard method for selecting a Secretary-General in future open selections. Waldheim's defeat also confirmed the informal two-term limit on the office of Secretary-General, and Pérez's selection firmly established the principle of regional rotation. The Secretary-General of the United Nations is appointed by the General Assembly on the recommendation of the Security Council. Therefore, candidates for the office can be vetoed by any of the permanent members. In 1981, Kurt Waldheim of Austria was finishing up his second term as Secretary-General, despite Chinese preferences for a Secretary-General from the Third World. In the 1971
1953 United Nations Secretary-General selection Nationalist China abstaining. Just before the meeting, Ambassador Lodge "dragooned" the Latin American delegates into voting for a man whom they had never heard of before. Hammarskjöld was caught by surprise when his phone rang in Stockholm shortly after midnight on 1 April 1953. Upon being told that he had been named the Secretary-General of the United Nations, he replied, "This April Fool's Day joke is in extremely bad taste." He finally believed the news after the third call. After consulting with the Swedish government, he cabled the President of the Security Council, "I do not feel I can refuse