TRANSCRIPT OF PRESS CONFERENCE BY DEPUTY SECRETARY-GENERAL LOUISE FR+CHETTE AT HEADQUARTERS, 19 FEBRUARY

Press Release
DSG/SM/41

TRANSCRIPT OF PRESS CONFERENCE BY DEPUTY SECRETARY-GENERAL LOUISE FRÉCHETTE AT HEADQUARTERS, 19 FEBRUARY

The SPOKESMAN: The Deputy Secretary-General briefed the Secretary- General on Wednesday on the status of United Nations reform, and I thought it would be interesting for you to get the same briefing, or essentially the same briefing.

There is a handout that she will be speaking to. So if you don't have one, please pick it up at the corner table. To the Deputy Secretary-General's right is her assistant, Blanca Antonini.

The DEPUTY SECRETARY-GENERAL: I joked at the United Nations Information Centre correspondents' dinner that what I do was not of great interest, as I can see by the packed room. Nevertheless, I think there is some interest in taking a broad look at where we are with the reform proposals of the Secretary- General. And what I'm going to give you today is a general overview of the various dimensions of the reform programme, rather than the detailed recommendation-by-recommendation account that, as you know, we submitted to the General Assembly last fall. That kind of detailed report, which contains a lot of factual information -- I'm sure if you're interested Fred could refer you to that report.

My comments will also focus on those elements of the reform that concern the Secretariat and those elements of the reform that are under the Secretary- General's own authority. I will deal with reform under the five clusters that you find on the first page of the handout, starting with the first one, which is entitled strategic direction and system-wide cohesiveness. There, you will see that we refer, first, to the senior management group, that's the group of senior officials of the United Nations -- including not only the Secretariat, but also funds and programmes -- that meets once a week, as well as the executive committees, which regroup these senior officials under four different sectors of concentration.

I think these are more than just bureaucratic contraptions or innovations. I think they probably have done more to change the mood and the atmosphere at the United Nations than almost any other initiative that was taken by the Secretary- General -- because, for the first time in 50 years, I think, there are basic and simple mechanisms to make everybody part of the same team. And I think it's worth recalling, therefore, these two particular recommendations.

There's a reference here to my role as Deputy Secretary-General. I don't want to spend much time talking about it. But simply to say that the division of labour between the Secretary-General and myself emerged very, very clearly in a very short time. I really was struck by the fact that there is a whole area of activity that comes naturally to the Deputy Secretary-General and that has much to do with internal management, internal coordination, particularly in the areas of the economic, social and development work of the United Nations. Whereas the Secretary-General, as you know from what you perceive every day, continues to be the external face of the United Nations, he continues to deal

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with all peace and security issues. He, of course, continues to assume full responsibility for everything that is happening in the United Nations. And his senior officials continue to report to him. But for practical purposes, on a day-to-day basis, I am involved very much in day-to-day management and coordination.

One of the elements of change that was put forward by the Secretary- General was, of course, the structural changes, the creation of the Department for Disarmament Affairs, the rationalization in the economic area. You are familiar with all of these things. There I would say that my sense is that these changes have proved their worth. Of course, when you disband departments and you regroup them and you reorganize them, it always takes a few months to find a new equilibrium, but I think that all of the changes are now very well in place, and I think they have been recognized as being very useful changes.

I will say one word about the Administrative Committee on Coordination, which is the Committee chaired by the Secretary-General, which regroups the heads of all the specialized agencies, as well as the Bretton Woods institutions and, of course, our own funds and programmes. This Committee, I will say, is much more active than in the past and engages the leaders of the various United Nations entities in discussions of policy issues of fundamental importance across the system. It has become a Committee that is of perhaps greater utility than at some other times in the past, where it tended to focus on administrative issues, and it wasn't always very exciting.

I think it's important to note that the heads of the Bretton Woods institutions participate in these meetings, and, therefore, twice a year there are meetings involving Michel Camdessus and Jim Wolfensohn and Ruggiero, as well as the heads of all the specialized agencies.

The second rubric has to do with management, management excellence. You know that we have embarked on what is likely to be a multi-year process of reform of our human-resource management system. You have all heard about the very slow and cumbersome processes that we have there. You have heard about morale problems among our more junior staff. What we're looking at is a thorough review of all the systems and procedures that are in place -- to make sure that we have a system that both produces the kind of expertise that the institution needs to meet the current and future challenges of the Organization, and also provides a satisfying career for our [staff]. We are just at the beginning of this process. I would think that we will need at least a couple of years before we can close that particular chapter of reform.

Same thing on the budgetary side of the reform. As you know, one of the major recommendations of the Secretary-General had to do with transforming the way in which the budget is presented to the General Assembly and debated in the General Assembly -— that's what results-based budgeting is all about. We've had a first exchange with the General Assembly on this idea. They have

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asked us to go back when we present the budget for the next biennium. It will continue to be presented in its traditional form, but it will be accompanied by an illustration of what a different approach to the budget would look like in at least two or three major areas of the Secretariat. So that is a process that will take, I think, probably at least another biennium before we get there, but it is engaged and we're working on this.

Efficiency measures I will not spend much time on, simply to say that when you live in reduced circumstances like we do, where efficiency measures are how we find the flexibility and how we find the resources to meet unexpected challenges or to be able to meet surges in demand, efficiency measures rank from the simplification of processes to common services for various units of the system. I would say that the search for efficiency measures will be a never- ending process. I think that should be par for the course for any organization that cares about making the best use of its resources.

Connected to that, of course, is the creation of this Development Account, because the Secretary-General had proposed to assign some of the savings that one could realize by being more efficient to an account that would be dedicated to funding projects for developing countries. This proposal is still before the General Assembly. There have been a number of discussions, and we expect they will come back to it in March when the Fifth Committee resumes it consideration of various items.

Time limits on mandates is also an issue that is still before the Assembly. There have been a number of discussions. It is still on the table. It will be for the Assembly to decide on what they want to do with this proposal.

I've put a note here on strengthening of internal controls. Simply to recall that one of the initiatives that pre-dates, of course, the arrival of the current Secretary-General is the creation of the Office of the Inspector General. I think that, after five years, that has again proved its worth. I think the Organization is much better equipped to review, in a sense, its internal processes. It is much better equipped to investigate when there are allegations of wrong-doing or fraud. And it is much better equipped to bring improvement and to learn lessons from the audits and evaluations that we may undertake.

The third area where we have some report on the impact of the reform is the role of the United Nations in economic and social affairs, which, as you know, is one of the most dispersed sectors of the United Nations. It is dispersed in terms of the number of units that are involved in this kind of activity and also dispersed geographically. One of the great goals of the reform is to try to make the United Nations function in a more coherent and cohesive fashion. Nowhere more than in the economic and social areas is it necessary to try to achieve a coherent set of activities for the United Nations.

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If you have looked at the Economic and Social Council for the last year or two -- a much maligned body of the United Nations that has often been criticized for perhaps not playing sufficiently the role that it is expected to paly by the Charter -- you will see that there have in fact been significant changes brought about over the last few years. Some of them, I think, are the result of our own work inside the Secretariat where we are approaching the work of ECOSOC and supporting the work of ECOSOC in a much more integrated fashion. There have been several instances of reporting to ECOSOC that have really brought together all the concerned units of the United Nations Secretariat. At the same time, the Member States themselves have taken some initiatives to provide better focus to their own discussions so that they can provide more useful guidance to the whole system in this area. You are aware of the meeting with the Bretton Woods institutions. There will be another one on 29 April. The introduction of a humanitarian segment in the work of ECOSOC, which is a new development and has allowed a much better dialogue between the Member States and the various humanitarian agencies, is generating, I think, very good guidance on the part of the Member States for the work of the United Nations in that sector.

The United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and the United Nations Centre for Human Settlements (Habitat) -- you know, there was a task force report that was requested by the Secretary-General. It is now being implemented. I think he will have taken note of the strong leadership that Klaus Töpfer is bringing to UNEP and Habitat. There have been both some clarification of the focus and mandate of UNEP and some interesting administrative rationalization in UNEP and Habitat that I think have demonstrated that in UNEP, as elsewhere in the United Nations system, there is a real commitment to change, to revitalizing the Organization. And the net result of that, as I understand it, is that the governing board of UNEP that met last week received very favourably the recommendations for change that had been brought forward, and that has been translated into something real, i.e. the agreement to increase resources to UNEP. And I think that is a good sign.

Regional commissions -- also another area where change and adjustment to changing circumstances was required. I think all the regional commissions have gone through their own process of adjustment. Last time the Member States looked at regional commissions, which was in ECOSOC in July, I think they expressed general satisfaction with the changes that have been introduced in the regional commissions. We are now in the process of looking at coherence of United Nations action at the regional level -- that is to say, the connection and the coordination that exists or doesn't exist between the regional commissions and the regional bodies of the various United Nations organs. In order to do that, I have been asked by ECOSOC to hold meetings in each of the regional commissions -- I started two weeks ago in Geneva -- to assess whether we can introduce improvements in the way we work together at the regional level.

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The fourth cluster has to do with operational activities. And I would say, for the vast majority of our Member States, this is the most important area of reform and the one that they can see and measure on the ground because it has to do with how we act together in the field, how well we respond to emergencies, how coherent we are in delivering on our development programmes. The Resident Coordinator system has been much strengthened. The Resident Coordinator nowadays really occupies a key function, and he is responding to the whole of the United Nations system. In the same way, the recommendation to develop a common development assistance framework is really bringing together all the funds and programmes of the United Nations in a common framework. We piloted the United Nations Development Assistance Framework (UNDAF) in 18 countries last year. We have already gone through a first phase of assessment. The UNDAF process will now be expanded throughout the system. I think the bottom line is that this is the right way to go. What I find interesting is that even though it is binding, in a sense only on the United Nations funds and programmes that report directly to the Secretary-General or have an accountability line directly to the Secretary-General, in fact in many countries the specialized agencies -- and in some cases the World Bank as well -- are full participants in this process. So, we are very pleased with the way this is developing. And, of course, United Nations Houses -- when they should be moving to common premises every time it is possible and financially sound, that is happening. I think we now have 32 designated United Nations Houses with the move under way.

I will only say a few words about response to emergencies. But in the same logic of acting in a more coherent and cohesive way, the transformation of the old Department of Humanitarian Affairs into the Office of the Coordinator, I think, has proved to be a real improvement.

I think that's now a function that has been performed very well and to the satisfaction of all this humanitarian community. They have brought a number of improvements to their systems, including trying to be more rational and better organized in their appeals for funds. If anybody is interested, we can talk about it afterwards.

In the same way, how we deal with post-conflict peace-building has always been a real challenge for the United Nations system -- how do we bring all the pieces together? There again, there have been a number of excellent systemic improvements, including the common guidelines for special representatives of the Secretary-General, and clarification of how they relate to the humanitarian and the development community. In short, I think we are seeing again in these areas a more cohesive and a more coherent United Nations.

Finally, in the Partnerships and Outreach Section, I think you will have recognized in this Secretary-General someone who is extremely open to non- governmental organizations (NGOs) and civil society at large. But I think it's also interesting to see how the various organs of the United Nations are

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becoming more and more open to outside participants in their work. The kind of sessions that are organized under ECOSOC, for instance, were certainly not very common even five years ago. I think this is a signal of increasing openness.

I want to say a word about the business community. This Secretary- General had indicated that he wanted to develop the United Nations links with the business community. It has been done through organic contacts with groups such as the International Chambers of Commerce and the Business Council on Sustainable Development. You will have seen that, in the Davos Forum, the Secretary-General has taken this connection with the business community one step further in proposing to them a kind of compact which engages them in the pursuit of some of the fundamental goals of the United Nations.

Finally, non-traditional sources of funding -- here, I think you have followed the setting-up of the Foundation in response to the gift by Mr. Turner. We now have a year of operation. The first year of funding has been fully allocated, and we certainly hope that this is just a first experience on which we can build to attract other contributors.

In conclusion, "Reform is a process, not an event" -- you've heard that before, but that is the reality. The word may not crop up all the time. I think any healthy organization continues changing and adapting to the realities and the challenges it faces. You don't always have to have a banner called "Reform" to recognize that there is change, there is positive change all the time, and it will continue that way.

In this connection I will simply mention that the Millennium Assembly will, we hope, prove to be another important step in this process of focusing the United Nations on the challenges of the future, on equipping the United Nations with the mandates, and the structures and the resources that it needs to meet these challenges.

I will stop here.

The SPOKESMAN: Thank you very much. We do have interpretation, so you may ask questions in English or French.

QUESTION: Your emphasis on cohesion -- one of the difficulties over the years, as in any bureaucracy, perhaps, is the rivalry between agencies. Has the Secretary-General addressed this particularly? And considering the fact that many of these agencies are autonomous or semi-autonomous, how much clout does he have to knock heads together, so to speak?

The DEPUTY SECRETARY-GENERAL: That's where I emphasized the really fundamental importance of these mechanisms that he set in place right from the start: this cabinet-style meeting every week and these executive committees.

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Yes, each agency -- the funds and programmes have their own governing board and they get their instructions from the Member States through this, but the fact is that there is a lot of room for a more cohesive United Nations within the same constitutional framework.

I think the secret, the key to this is to have a much more open sharing of information and to create space for a [normalization?] of the thinking and the policies. That's what these weekly meetings do. It creates a big difference. When you think that in the past the head of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) or the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) would see the Secretary-General very occasionally -- and the ones who were not living in New York even more occasionally -- it isn't surprising that there might have been a sense of rivalry or certainly of profound disconnection. Now every week, we all come together around the same table. They can relate to the Secretary-General every week. When he's not there, I chair the meeting.

It has changed profoundly the culture of the United Nations system. If you ask anybody, they will tell you that that is palpable. It doesn't mean that we've resolved all the problems of rivalry and all the problems of duplication, but I think there is a measurable difference in how we relate to one another and, therefore, in how we deal with the problems, how we report to the Security Council, how we act in the field, how we respond to emergencies.

QUESTION (interpretation from French): We have read in various interventions this year more than 60 statements on non-governmental organizations, reforms, the International Criminal Court. The question we're interested in at the moment is the speech you made at the Canadian Institute of Foreign Affairs, in Toronto, paraphrasing the Secretary-General, saying that the structures of globalization must rest on values and principles. In the course of your statement, you said "I am aware of the fact that a State's adhesion to standards can be tinted with hypocrisy, but, as La Rouchefoucauld said, hypocrisy was the tribute that vice renders to virtue." What does this mean, Madame?

The DEPUTY SECRETARY-GENERAL (interpretation from French): I think I was describing the facts. The challenge of globalization is a matter of harnessing forces that can be positive and they will contribute fundamentally to the development of States and to the well-being of individuals, but this must be done in a manner which is respectful of principles.

When I refer to respect for principles, I'm thinking of the rights of individuals; I'm thinking of equity. We can have an unruly type of globalization which will leave a great majority out in the cold, and I think we see that in many places. We see a widening chasm between a group that is deriving tremendous benefits from globalization, and other sectors in the same society who are becoming more and more marginalized. This, I think, is a principle that is very dear to the United Nations, which is to introduce the

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element of fairness, the dimension of human rights in development and in the economic machine as a whole.

QUESTION: If you could explain more what happens after Mr. Paschke's team finishes an investigation. We read about them. You have him doing an investigation within three months of the offence, and it can be someone forging documents or someone else having conflict of interest on publications.

In the cases adjudicated, quite often innocent, a year or two years later, even if the person is innocent, this seems an awfully long time for something to come to a head, considering that he has done the bulk of the work already. It's not like the investigation is starting from scratch once it goes to whatever committees it goes to. Everyone involved in this is [tracked?]; the person is on suspension with full pay. This seems an inordinate amount of time, and some of the decisions are highly questionable, considering what these investigations have shown.

The DEPUTY SECRETARY-GENERAL: Well, I would not want to pass judgement on the quality of the decisions that are made or the judgements that are made, but I think a system of justice -- and, we have to allow, our own internal justice system -- to be fair must also be expeditious to the maximum extent possible. I have heard a lot of complaints with the fact that sometimes it takes a long time for issues to be resolved.

I think there is always a dilemma. I have seen it in national administrations, as well, where the concern for due process and rights of appeal and rights of review and so on are built into justice processes, which result in a long time, which, at times, is very painful for people who, at the end of the process, will be found to be clean.

In the context of the human resource management system, I would like to look at the justice system, as well, to see if it can be improved, if it can be made a little more agile. But since you've asked me a question about what happens to Mr. Paschke's report, and you've put it in those terms, I would say one has to deal individuals and what accountability mechanisms kick in vis-à-vis the individual. But I think the other part is what happens to the system. Do we learn the lessons and do we adjust our procedures and finish our procedures to allow better oversight capabilities? In effect, this is a very important role of Mr. Paschke, and in my book, it's at least as important to deal with individual responsibility to make sure that we have a system that will avoid repetition. Paschke will tell you that, in fact, the right of implementation of his recommendations is quite high and comparable to what you would find in public administration.

QUESTION: Does the General Assembly and its various Committees, like the Fifth or some of the others, still micromanage the reform programme?

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The DEPUTY SECRETARY-GENERAL: Well, there are many things that are within the purview of the Secretary-General and are not referred to the Assembly for decision. I think we have a duty to inform the Assembly and we have done that, I think, very faithfully.

Other sectors require decisions on the part of the Assembly and there I think there is a need for a good understanding between the Secretary-General and the Member States as to the long-term goals that they are pursuing. I think we have to do a good job of providing the Member States with the big picture and, in return, we would hope to be able to advance on the big picture rather than to be stopped on small details.

Again, I think if you look at the relationship between the Secretariat and the General Assembly on matters like that, it is not unlike what you would find in national governments between the government and the parliament. There is always room for discussion as to how much control and how much control is too much control and how much management is micromanagement. I think this is a dynamic relationship.

QUESTION: I wondered if you could give us a few more examples of how the United Nations response to emergencies has been further rationalized. You mentioned the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA). Where else in the system have you seen implementation of that kind of [inaudible]?

The DEPUTY SECRETARY-GENERAL: I mentioned OCHA because OCHA has a responsibility to bring together all of the humanitarian agencies. In fact, Mr. de Mello chairs a unique committee in the sense of the United Nations system, the Inter-Agency Standing Committee on Humanitarian Affairs, because it brings together all the United Nations humanitarian actors, but it also has the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC); it also has, I think, a couple of NGOs, and it relates very closely with the donor community.

Where improvements have been brought, I think, is in terms of developing agreed systems to coordinate the humanitarians in the field. I find it interesting, for instance, that in Sierra Leone, where we have faced a real challenge, suddenly, to meet humanitarian needs, a mission was sent. There is now a guidelines paper where all the humanitarian actors in the United Nations system -- and I think the NGOs and the bilateral donors quite spontaneously rally around that. We are just more clear and more explicit as to who does what, what we are trying to do. In Afghanistan, we also developed an approach that referred to -- I think we have a talent for creating titles and acronyms that I am not sure always serves us well, because at the end of the day it is always the same thing we're trying to do, which is to find models where we will work better together, where we can actually work, not only better together, but work with the donors, with the recipient countries, with the NGO community -- whatever you call that, [UNDAF?] or Strategic Framework for some countries.

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This is really the driving -- in fact, it is probably the strongest -- vector of the reform programme. I am very encouraged by the fact that we now get positive feedback from some of our critics, from our donor countries, for instance, who have demanded for years that we act more coherently. "Get your act together. Please come together. They are now saying "Yay! We are actually seeing a difference." And I think there are a number of NGOs, also, who are our partners in the field and have also noted the fact that we now do work better together.

QUESTION: The Secretary-General said here about two months ago that it was time to stop the Organization over reform and to let the United Nations get back to its real work. I was just wondering if you could talk a little bit about the relationship, in terms of reform and some of these initiatives, between the Secretariat and the Assembly. What do you realistically expect is left to happen and when do you expect to see it? I mean, specifically results- based budgeting and time limits have not been embraced by the Assembly. I don't know how realistic it is to expect all of this to happen by the conclusion of the fifty-third session.

The DEPUTY SECRETARY-GENERAL: Well, first of all, let's recall that reform is not cuts. I think where the Secretary-General has said that we've been cut a lot and we should not be focusing only on the size of the budget, doesn't mean that he is not firmly committed to continuing to improve the Organization. I hope that the purpose of this briefing, I think, is to demonstrate that what he committed to doing a year and a bit ago is in fact happening and is starting to show results. There are issues that have been put to the Assembly that are yet under consideration.

On results-based budgeting, I will say, in fact it is totally understandable that it should take a couple of bienniums for that to happen. If you look around the world, there are very few countries that actually have results-based budgeting in its full concept. Only a few countries have actually applied it. I think we can draw satisfaction from the fact that our first submission to the Assembly has been well received, that they have asked to see more and to develop the concept much more broadly for the next consideration. Our hope is that, not for the next biennium but for the following one, 2002-2003, we might be ready to move to a full results-based budgeting format.

QUESTION: There are dozens of Member States that are denied their vote in the Assembly under Article 19, and you've got one Member State, the United States, that owes over $1 billion. How can you hope to give the Organization a strong financial footing if you've got a problem that's this widespread and also deep in terms of Members paying their assessments?

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The DEPUTY SECRETARY-GENERAL: If it's another way of asking me whether the fact that the United States has important arrears with the Organization is a factor in maintaining commitment to reform and to improvement, whether it's a factor in engaging the United Nations in having a real positive vision for the United Nations and having some ambitions for the role that it can play -- of course, it is a factor. And I think the Secretary-General has said this several times, and I certainly have said so too -- it is a factor. It is something that the Member States among themselves will have to resolve.

But what I'm trying to say here is that it is a factor, but it isn't the only thing in the picture. There are a lot of good reasons for the Secretary- General and his team to want to continue to improve the Organization. What we're doing is not solely in response or necessarily connected to conditions that have been set or to the financial problem. I think there is a commitment to excellence in the Secretariat, in doing what we do with the resources that we're given as best we can.

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