Global Policy Forum

The Fifth Committee (Administrative and Budgetary) began its first resumed session today, agreeing on the programme of work for the coming four weeks and taking up a large number of reports on its agenda. Among the important issues before the Committee this month are human resources management, means of encouraging Member States to pay their arrears to the Organization, administration of justice at the United Nations, information and communications technology, and the matters related to the pattern of conferences within the United Nations system.

During the discussion of the measures to encourage Member States in arrears to reduce and eventually pay their debt to the Organization, speakers reaffirmed the countries' legal obligation to bear the expenses of the Organization in accordance with the Charter of the United Nations and pay their assessed contributions in full, on time and without conditions. Several Committee members, however, also insisted on the need to be sympathetic to the Member States experiencing genuine economic difficulties.

While considering proposals to encourage payment, Peru's representative (on behalf of the Rio Group) stressed the need to provide incentives and not to make it more difficult for countries willing to pay, but who were lacking the resources to do so. In most cases, States in arrears were developing countries, and tightening the conditions of their debt would only result in increasing their load. If the policies towards arrears were tightened, a growing number of countries would fall under Article 19 of the Charter, under which a Member of the United Nations in arrears in payment of its dues in an amount that equals or exceeds the dues for two preceding years can lose its vote in the General Assembly. That would politically impact the Organization. In fact, Article 19 already provided for a system of sanctions to ensure compliance with financial obligations to the Organization.

Speaking on behalf of the "Group of 77" developing countries and China, the representative of Morocco supported recent decisions on multi-year payment plans, which were a useful tool for reducing arrears, while remaining voluntary and not automatically linked to other measures. As for the indexation of interest on arrears, she said that although aimed at encouraging payment of arrears, such measures would impose an additional burden on developing countries already facing economic difficulties. If interest were to be imposed on arrears due to the Organization, one could argue that the same should be done concerning the amounts due to Member States, many of which were developing countries.

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