The World Security Council is an international organization based around ideals of maintaining global security and fostering world peace. They are positioned above S.H.I.E.L.D. Following Loki's theft of the Tesseract, S.H.I.E.L.D. director Nicholas Fury convened with the Council, clarifying that Loki had acted on his own, independent of Asgard and that Loki's step-brother Thor was not hostile. The Council suggested that he move to Phase Two of developing Tesseract-powered weaponry, but he insisted that they were not ready. Instead, he suggested reactivating the Avengers Initiative, to which the Council offered reservations, not sharing his faith in a small team of super-humans.