03 Oct 2014
(New York, 3 October 2014)
1 Thank you, Mr Chairman. I have the honour to speak on behalf of the Member States of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) on the organization of work of the Fifth Committee for this session.
2 ASEAN congratulates you and all the members of the Bureau on your election. We have no doubt that under your leadership the Fifth Committee will reach a successful, constructive and punctual conclusion to its deliberations at this session. We take this opportunity to express our sincere appreciation to Ambassador Janne Taalas and the members of the Bureau for the 68th session for their exemplary work during the last session. We also thank the Secretariat for their invaluable contributions.
3 ASEAN members align ourselves with the statement made by the Plurinational State of Bolivia on behalf of the Group of 77 and China.
4 ASEAN will pay close attention to the discussions on the agenda items that have been allocated to the Committee as contained in document A/C.5/69/1, in particular Special Political Missions, human resources management, and the programme budget for the biennium 2014-2015. We reiterate that the Secretariat must be given sufficient resources to fulfill mandates approved by the General Assembly. ASEAN also reaffirms our support for the Secretariat’s efforts to improve its ability to deliver on mandates and to optimise its functioning. In this regard, we attach great importance to the discussions on the funding and backstopping of Special Political Missions, including the creation of a separate account.
5 As always, the Fifth Committee has a heavy and complex agenda before it. The amount of time available for the Committee to deliberate on certain agenda items has been affected by the late issuance of documents in previous sessions. We urge the Secretariat and the Advisory Committee on Administrative and Budgetary Questions to ensure the timely issuance of their reports.
6 ASEAN looks forward to engaging constructively with all delegations in the forthcoming session.
7 Thank you, Mr Chairman.
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