Sixty-fifth General Assembly

Plenary

51^st Meeting (AM)

General Assembly Makes Appointments to Administrative, Budgetary Bodies

 

Acting on the recommendations of its Fifth Committee (Administrative and Budgetary), the General Assembly today appointed officials to several of its subsidiary bodies for terms of office beginning on 1 January 2011, including its influential Advisory Committee on Administrative and Budgetary Questions (ACABQ), which plays a crucial role in managing the United Nations vast human and financial resources.

Appointed to a three-year term of office on the 16-member Advisory Committee were Namgya Khampa (India), Peter Maddens (Belgium), Carlos Ruiz Massieu (Mexico), Richard Moon (United Kingdom), Akira Sugiyama (Japan) and Zhang Wanhai (China), beginning on 1 January 2011.

The Assembly also appointed six members to its Committee on Contributions, which advises it on the apportionment, under Article 17 of the United Nations Charter, of the Organization’s expenses among Members broadly according to the capacity to pay.  Appointed for three years beginning on 1 January 2011 were Joseph Acakpo-Satchivi ( Benin), Gordon Eckersley ( Australia), Bernardo Greiver del Hoyo ( Uruguay), Juan Ndong Mbomio Mangue ( Equatorial Guinea), Pedro Luis Pedroso ( Cuba) and Thomas Schlesinger ( Austria).

In addition, the Assembly confirmed the Secretary-General’s reappointment of Achim Kassow ( Germany) and William McDonough ( United States) as regular members of the Investments Committee for three-year terms beginning on 1 January 2011.  Hélène Ploix ( France) was reappointed as a regular member for a one-year term, and Simon Jiang ( China) was appointed for a three-year term.  Ad Hoc Committee member Ivan Pictet ( Switzerland) was reappointed to a one-year term, while Hilda Ochoa-Brillembourg ( Venezuela) was appointed to a one-year term.  That Committee provides advice and recommendations to the Secretary-General as fiduciary for the investments of the United Nations Joint Staff Pension Fund.

Turning its attention to the 15-member International Civil Service Commission (ICSC) — an independent expert body established by the Assembly to coordinate service conditions for United Nations staff — the Assembly appointed Marie-Françoise Bechtel (France), Daasebre Oti Boateng (Ghana), Carleen Gardner (Jamaica), Kingston Papie Rhodes (Sierra Leone) and Eugeniusz Wyzner (Poland) to a four-year term beginning on 1 January 2011.  Mr. Rhodes was subsequently appointed as Chair of the Commission for a four-year term.

Finally, the Assembly appointed the following persons to the Independent Audit Advisory Committee, for three-year terms beginning on 1 January 2011:  Vadim Vadimovich Dubinkin ( Russian Federation), Vinod Rai ( India) and Adrian Patrick Strachan ( Jamaica).  Members are appointed to the Advisory Committee in their personal capacity and are independent of the Government that nominated them.  The Committee itself is independent of the Board of Auditors, the Joint Inspection Unit (JIU) and the United Nations Secretariat, and advises the Assembly on the scope, results and effectiveness of audit and other oversight functions.

The General Assembly will reconvene at 10 a.m. Tuesday, 23 November, to hold its joint debate on integrated and coordinated implementation of and follow-up to the outcomes of the major United Nations conferences and summits in the economic, social and related fields.

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For information media • not an official record