Statement on the Working Methods of the First Committee and Programme Planning by Konstantin Vorontsov, Deputy Head of the Delegation of the Russian Federation, in the First Committee of the 80th session of the UNGA
Mr. Chair,
We would like to congratulate you on the election to this post and hope that under your leadership the session of the First Committee will be effective and successful. The Russian delegation is ready to provide you with full support.
We are grateful to the UN Office for Disarmament Affairs for its support in implementing the decisions of the UN Security Council and the UN General Assembly. Such support shall be impartial, depoliticized, equidistant and carried out in strict accordance with the mandates granted by the Member States. We put forward same requirements to the preparation of the draft program of work of the First Committee.
In the context of optimization of the First Committee work, we would like to emphasize the importance of using existing resources in the most effective manner to ensure that the Committee can fully perform functions entrusted to it. Discussions and amendments to the established working methods must be well-calibrated, balanced, and consistent with the objectives of this body.
We are seriously concerned about the new practice of arbitrary introduction during the intersessional period of proposals to fundamentally review the organization of work of the First Committee, including significantly reducing the number of meetings, merging thematic discussions, reducing the number of statements and time provided for them. All these issues require a thoughtful approach, detailed consideration, and consultations with all Member States during formal meetings. Hurry in such matters could not only impact negatively the work of this body, but also have more serious consequences.
We should not forget that the UN General Assembly First Committee is the most important forum for addressing the issues of arms control, disarmament, and non-proliferation and international security in general. This forum plays a key role in ensuring global peace and stability. Optimization measures such as reducing time for discussions, merging statements and shortening their duration devalue dialogue within the Committee on important issues on the international agenda and may lead to further degradation of the situation in the world. We are satisfied that a number of radical proposals related to organization of work of the Committee have been abandoned. However, certain ideas (such as reducing the time of statements and meetings) have been retained.
We believe it is crucial in the future to maintain an optimal balance between optimizing the work of the First Committee and ensuring its proper functioning, taking into account challenges the Committee is facing in complicated geopolitical environment. We consider the proposed changes as a one-time action that establish no precedent for the future. We underline the need to return at the 81st session of the UN General Assembly to the traditional number of meetings and format of statements by delegations in the framework of the First Committee (first of all during thematic discussions).
Mr. Chair,
We would like to specifically address last year's initiative of the South Africa and Singapore regarding the "deanonymization" of initiators of voting on documents approved within the First Committee. It appears that the procedure implemented during the 79th session of the UN General Assembly First Committee in this regard not only failed to facilitate the search for compromises and strengthen the positive agenda of the First Committee, but, on the contrary, introduced additional politicization into the work of the forum. Furthermore, as far as we can judge from our contacts with the initiators of this approach, their idea was that information on the delegations that requested the vote would be provided only to the authors of draft resolutions in response to a corresponding request.
We believe it would be appropriate to discuss whether this initiative will be implemented at the current First Committee session, and if so, what scheme will be used. For our part, we propose that the First Committee Secretariat directly informs either sponsors of the draft resolution or the State that submitted the request about who exactly put its submitted draft and/or its individual paragraphs to the vote. Delegations that received necessary information could use it to analyze the situation and, if necessary, conduct targeted work with interested countries. This would help to avoid the negative last year experience when accusatory rhetoric and politicization were introduced into the consideration of draft resolutions.
Mr. Chair,
Recently, proposals have been made to reduce the number of annual resolutions containing purely technical changes and to shift them to a biennial or triennial basis. Such ideas will only be meaningful if the relevant decision is taken by the author of the draft resolution as well as the realistic opportunity remains to return the relevant documents to the annual submission, if necessary. Reducing the number of resolutions submitted should not be achieved at the expense of restricting the rights of States to submit documents and advance their own approaches to various arms control, disarmament and non-proliferation issues.
Regarding possible measures to improve effectiveness of the Committee, we would recommend moving the deadline for submitting draft resolutions to the third week of the session, which would provide additional time for consultations on them.
We would also recommend optimizing the First Committee web-page on the UN portal and e-delegate platform to facilitate the work with them, including providing timely publication of full statements at the same day the are delivered. This idea is especially important in the light of the proposal to reduce the time of statements during the thematic debates. Furthermore, we would like to encourage delegations to provide translations of their national statements into English.
Finally, we would like to draw attention to the issue of the participation of non-state actors in expert groups established by the General Assembly resolutions. The parameters of such participation must be fully consistent with the rules of procedure of the UN General Assembly and established practice of the First Committee. It shall be carried out without detriment to the intergovernmental nature of the respective body as a whole, should not provoke politicization of the discussions and confrontation with the UN Member States. Adherence to these principles will help to avoid future problems and ensure the effective work of the mentioned bodies.
Thank you for your attention.
