Committee on NGOs                                     NGO/398

783^rd Meeting (PM)                                     24 January 2001

NGO COMMITTEE RECOMMENDS CONSULTATIVE STATUS FOR TWO ORGANIZATIONS,

DISCUSSES METHODS OF WORK

The Committee on Non-governmental Organizations met this afternoon to continue consideration of its methods of work, new applications for consultative status and new requests for reclassification, during its resumed 2000 session.

The 19-member Committee on Non-governmental Organizations makes recommendations on applications from non-governmental organizations (NGOs) for standing with the Economic and Social Council, and on requests for reclassification of that standing.  Non-governmental organizations may be granted either general, special or roster consultative status, according to their work, with different privileges and obligations, according to the different categories.

During discussion of the Committee’s methods of work, the Chief of the NGO Section, Hanifa Mezoui, reported that the working group had reviewed NGO accreditation procedure, NGO training, the huge increase in the number of applications and designing a new questionnaire, among other issues.  She said  that they had concluded that a new mechanism was needed to deal with some

800 applications for the 2001 session and that translation of applications into all six United Nations official languages was also found to be desirable.

The Committee Chairman, Levent Bilman (Turkey), thanked members of the working group for their work and asked them to find time to look further into the issues facing the Committee before its May session.  He suggested that the main task of the working group should be drafting a new questionnaire which he believed would go a long way towards solving some of the problems the Committee faced.

The Committee then took up consideration of applications from NGOs whose representatives were at the meeting and subsequently recommended special consultative status for Monitor International, roster consultative status for Support Coalition International, and deferred the application from International Commission on Distance Education

Revisiting the application from the International Commission on Distance Education requesting special consultative status, the representative of France asked how it was possible for the organization to have a permanent member at the United Nations before receiving accreditation.  The representatives of Algeria and Germany asked why the NGO was registered in two countries.  The Committee decided to defer the application pending a response to additional questions from members.

Committee on NGOa                   - 2 -             Press Release NGO/398

783^rd Meeting (PM)                                     24 January 2001

Responding to members’ questions regarding the application from Monitor International, the NGO representative said his organization served as a secretariat for two networks:  Lakenet, a network of some 400 governments and organizations concerned with the conservation and management of 130 lakes around the world, and Global Environment Facility.  They were also involved in projects in 88 developing countries.  With regard to their request for general consultative status, the NGO representative said that the environment could not be treated in isolation, as fresh water problems often impacted on health and welfare issues. The Committee decided to recommend special consultative status for the NGO.

On the application from Support Coalition International requesting general consultative status, the Committee decided to recommend roster consultative status after hearing from the NGO’s representative, who said that their main aim was breaking the silence about psychiatric abuse, which they viewed as human rights abuse.  She informed the Committee that in Germany, at the Free University of Berlin, a tribunal had indicted psychiatry. 

The representatives of Tunisia, India, Cuba, Sudan, Chile, Colombia, Ethiopia, Russian Federation, Algeria, China, Bolivia, United States, and Pakistan spoke on applications and other matters.

The Committee will meet again at 10 a.m. Thursday, 25 January, to consider applications.

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