Delegates Urge Quality Services, Equal Treatment for Official Languages at All Four UN Headquarters, as Fifth Committee Discusses Pattern of Conferences
Delegates in the Fifth Committee (Administrative and Budgetary) today laid out their intentions to ensure the United Nations can stage quality conferences — equally accessible to every Member State — at all four headquarters.
Cuba’s representative, speaking for the Group of 77 and China, called for the delivery of quality conference services, with equal treatment of the six official languages to support the Organization’s intergovernmental and expert bodies. “This principle must be ensured at every moment, which means that conference modalities must not allow for different treatment among Member States, including by preventing any impediments that would hinder Member States from participating in virtual or in-person meetings,” he said.
Switzerland’s delegate, also speaking for Liechtenstein, acknowledged the value of in-person meetings and the need to ensure all delegations have equal access to all conferences at the Organization’s four headquarters — Geneva, Nairobi, New York and Vienna. She urged the Committee to send the Secretariat a mandate to create a framework that would best use technology to let Member States benefit from remote participation and in-person meetings.
The speaker for the Russian Federation noted that, last year, the Assembly requested an examination of best practices on hybrid and remote meetings and the Secretariat carried out its analysis, which was viewed by the Committee on Conferences. Yet, there is no new Secretariat decision on strengthening the remote component of meetings, which is part of a large number of problems, he said.
The representative of Qatar emphasized his Government’s support of the digitation of the Organization’s historic documents and the digitation project that involves all six official languages. His Government supported the first stage of this project with $5 million and will provide $2.4 million for the second stage, which begin this year.
Ai Abo, Chair of the Committee on Conferences, introduced its report for 2023, which was adopted at its substantive session held from 5 to 11 September. The report also includes a draft resolution on the pattern of conferences and a draft calendar of conferences and meetings of the United Nations for 2024.
Movses Abelian, Under-Secretary-General for General Assembly and Conference Management, introduced the Secretary-General’s report on the pattern of conferences, which covers activity during 2022 at New York, Geneva, Vienna and Nairobi. The Department for General Assembly and Conference Management continues to focus on workforce planning as staff retire and technology advances while meeting the Organization’s core mandates, including multilingualism and the efficiency and quality of conference management operations, he said.
Abdallah Bachar Bong, Chair of the Advisory Committee on Administrative and Budgetary Questions (ACABQ) introduced the Advisory Committee’s related report on the pattern of conferences. Regarding meetings management, the Advisory Committee trusts that the financial impact of the 2022 meetings information for the four duty stations will be provided in the Department’s next budget submission.
Pattern of Conferences
AI ABO, Chair of the Committee on Conferences, introduced its report for 2023 (document A/78/32), which was adopted at its substantive session held from 5 to 11 September. The report also includes a draft resolution on the pattern of conferences and a draft calendar of conferences and meetings of the United Nations for 2024, for the Fifth Committee’s consideration and recommendation for the General Assembly’s adoption. During the session, Member States were able to engage in a questions-and-answers session with representatives of the Department for General Assembly and Conference Management in New York and at the three duty stations in Geneva, Vienna and Nairobi.
Regarding the calendar of conferences and meetings, the Committee on Conferences considered a 10 August letter, signed by 12 Member States, requesting that the Lunar New Year be included in the list of floating holidays of the United Nations, starting in 2024. She reminded delegates that the Committee on Conferences has four vacancies for members from the Group of Latin American and Caribbean States to be filled.
MOVSES ABELIAN, Under-Secretary-General for General Assembly and Conference Management, presented the Secretary-General’s annual report on the pattern of conferences (document A/78/96), which covers 2022. Last year, conference services gradually returned to the pre-pandemic mode of operation and around the world, there was a 66 per cent year-on-year increase in the number of meetings. The proportion of meetings held in either virtual or hybrid mode fell to 35 per cent, down from 66 per cent in 2021, reflecting a greater return to in-person meetings, he said. Almost all key performance indicators showed improvement compared with 2021, despite high vacancy levels at some duty stations and an 11 per cent year-on-year increase in translation workload, which reached 243 million words globally in 2022. Continued modernization remains the basis of the Department’s strategy and progress was made in integrating Department tools that are crucial to implementing its mandates with other enterprise systems, such as Umoja and Inspira.
The report details several innovations that significantly improved several services available to Member States. For instance, the in-house translation system, eLUNa, added a new feature that translates a full document with neural machine translation and enhances its automated quality assurance function. New dashboards were created to facilitate evidence-based decision-making and planning, including statistics on recycled text and reprise credit calculation. Looking ahead, he said the Department faces a large number of retirements and an ever-changing technological landscape, with increased artificial intelligence capabilities regarding language tools. From 30 September 2023 to 31 December 2032, 477 staff members, or 31.7 per cent of the 1,505 staff on board as of 30 September 2023, that are currently on established posts will reach mandatory retirement age. Of this amount 51.6 per cent, or 246 people, are staff on language posts.
“Our focus is on proactive workforce-planning and streamlined recruitment, outreach and new learning programmes for staff,” he said, adding that more than half of the Department’s outreach efforts in2022 were focused on Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean. Turning to accessibility, he said the Department is in line with the United Nations Disability Inclusion Strategy and relevant recommendations of the Joint Inspection Unit. It continues to collaborate with other entities to meet the accessibility needs of delegates and other users of conference services and raise awareness of accessibility issues. The Accessibility Centre provides assistive devices and Braille printing on request. Sign-language interpretation where mandated, accessible parliamentary documentation and assistance in meeting rooms are also provided, and relevant in-house information technology systems were enhanced. “Our focus will continue to be ensuring the successful delivery of our core mandates, namely, the principle of multilingualism, the efficiency of conference management operations and the quality of our client-facing services,” he said.
ABDALLAH BACHAR BONG, Chair of the Advisory Committee on Administrative and Budgetary Questions (ACABQ), introduced the Advisory Committee’s related report (document A/78/544). Regarding meetings management, the Advisory Committee trusts that the financial impact of the 2022 meetings information for the four duty stations will be provided in the Department’s next budget submission. The Committee also notes the information on the interpretation utilization factor in the four duty stations, which shows a higher factor in Nairobi, compared to other duty stations. It would like a clear explanation of the differences in the next Secretariat report on the pattern of conferences, he said. Regarding documents management, ACABQ again welcomes the efforts to digitize historic and older documents of the Organization and trusts that detailed information on the project’s financial aspects will be included in the next budget submission. He noted the Department’s ongoing efforts to ensure all vacant posts are filled expeditiously.
Regarding sign language, the Advisory Committee recommends that the General Assembly ask the Secretary-General to include detailed information on the Organization’s sign language services in the next pattern of conferences report. This should include the number of persons benefiting from the services, a comparison with services provided in similar organizations, and an explanation of the reasons for any variance in the services.
RICHARD TUR DE LA CONCEPCIÓN (Cuba), speaking on behalf of the Group of 77 and China, said the Group trusts the proposed draft resolution will be a good framework for the Fifth Committee’s consideration and thanked conference staff for ensuring “the vitality of labours” of the Organization and its actions to gradually return to the pre-pandemic level of in-person meetings. He called for the delivery of quality conference services, with equal treatment of the six official languages to support the Organization’s intergovernmental and expert bodies. As enshrined in the Charter of the United Nations, the Organization is based on the principle of the sovereign equality of all its members. “This principle must be ensured at every moment, which means that conference modalities must not allow for different treatment among Member States, including by preventing any impediments that would hinder Member States from participating in virtual or in-person meetings,” he said.
The Group is aware that the Organization’s liquidity shortage has led to a freeze in hiring, which particularly affects the language services staff. He commended steps taken to reach language professionals, especially in Africa, Latin American and the Caribbean, to diversify language backgrounds and promote the equitable geographical representation of the staff. The Group urges the Secretary-General and Member States to follow guidelines and procedures regarding the use of United Nations premises for meetings, conferences, special events and exhibits. “We remind that every activity hosted in its facilities must be consistent with the purposes and principles of the United Nations,” he said. The Group also supports efforts to increase the accessibility of persons with disabilities to United Nations premises and conference services. The Group remains concerned with the deteriorating conditions of the Nairobi conference centre, which severely hampers its capacity to provide conference services, especially for regular calendar meetings of United Nations bodies headquartered in Nairobi, he said.
SERGIO FRANÇA DANESE (Switzerland), also speaking on behalf of Liechtenstein, said it is essential that the Fifth Committee provide the conference services staff with the necessary framework and tools to organize the Organization’s meetings in the most appropriate formats. The pandemic has accelerated the pre-existing trend towards greater use of technology for staging meetings. “We are well aware that nothing can replace face-to-face meetings,” she said, adding that personal interactions are an essential part of the Organization’s work. Yet, this should not prevent the creation of a framework that lets Member States benefit from remote participation. But, the Assembly has not successfully established a mandate on this issue, which poses challenges, including universal access. Access to conferences is essential and must be guaranteed for all delegations as the open issues are addressed by Member States and the Secretariat. “Modern conference modalities represent the future and cannot be ignored if we truly wish to have a UN that is both modern and effective,” she said. Member States must give the Secretariat a mandate to develop options and guarantee modern, high-quality conferences.
NASSIR ABDULAZIZ AL-NASSER (Qatar), aligning himself with the Group of 77 and China, commended the joint efforts of the Department for General Assembly and Conference Management and the Department of Global Communications to digitize the Organization’s historic documents in order to increase global access to these documents over the Internet. These documents, some of which are 70 years old, are an historic source of information and important for researchers as they provide a history of the Organization and preserve a common heritage, he said. His delegation welcomed the Organization’s progress in the digitization project that involves all six languages. Since 1945 more than 4,000 documents have been digitized. In its partnership with the United Nations, Qatar supported the first stage of the digitization process from 2013 to 2018 with $5 million. It will provide $2.4 million for the second stage, which runs from 2023 to 2029, and preserves the precious information contained in old documents.
DANIIL A. DEVYATKIN (Russian Federation) commended the draft resolution on the pattern of conferences, coordinated at the September session of the Committee on Conferences, whose body work is crucial to Secretariat efforts to ensure the principle of multilingualism, a fundamental value of the Organization. His delegation traditionally pays great attention to the quality of written and oral translations into all six languages at the United Nations. He noted that the Fifth Committee also is tasked with ensuring adequate working conditions for the linguistic units. In Assembly resolution 77/262, Member States requested an examination of the state-of-the-art lessons learned regarding hybrid and remote meetings. An Assembly mandate is required for these meetings. The Secretariat carried out its analysis, which was viewed by the Committee on Conferences. Yet, no new decision has been taken regarding strengthening the remote component of meetings. This question is part of a large number of problems, and he shared the concerns of the Group of 77 and China.