16th Meeting of Senior Fellowships Officers of the ... - Development

Opening Statements 7
had been sponsored by a group of Arab States. The other resolution on North Korea
nuclear testin had been sponsored by Japan. Whereas the African delegations felt
that the situation in Darfur, Sudan, did not enjoy the urgency it deserved. Therefore,
they did not sign upon the Lebanon draft resolution. Voting patterns on those draft
resolutions had shown a wide area of misunderstandings and distrust. The issue of
enlargement of the UN Security Council membership and expansion of the new
permanent members was no rose garden either among developing countries.
30. Dr. Gurirab judged that South-South cooperation stood in front of the door to the
intensive care unit of a fictional hospital. He hoped that the diagnosis would not
be life-threatening. As trade unionists had put it, “united we stand, divided we fall.”
South-South cooperation was a vital kernel for the socio-economic advancement and
the far-reaching technological breakthroughs in the 21st century.
31. Talking about globalization, Dr. Gurirab quoted the Millennium Declaration:
“For, while globalization offers great opportunities, at present its benefits are very
unevenly shared, while costs are unevenly distributed.” He stressed that the problem
of failing to getting it right ought not to be left solely in the hands of the
South because dreams deferred for too long would explode and everybody would
suffer. Therefore, the dream of more than two billions of human beings was too
big a powder keg to neglect. Conscience, compassion and cooperation were sacred
virtues of human society.
C. General Introduction by Mr. Furio De Tomassi, Chief of
Personnel Service, UN/DESA, and Secretary for Inter-Agency
Fellowship Coordination
32. Mr. De Tomassi congratulated Mr. Alexandre Goubarev on his election as Chairman
of the 16th Meeting of Senior Fellowships Officers and paid tribute to his predecessor,
Dr. Abdul Al-Mashat, Chairman of the 15th Meeting, who had in the meantime
resigned from the World Bank and had returned to the academic career in his home
country, Egypt.
33. He expressed his deep appreciation to UNESCO for the generous acceptance to host
the 16th Meeting of Senior Fellowships Officers of the United Nations system and
major national placement and supervising agencies and underlined UNESCO’s role
to enhance human resource capacities in the developing world through the initiative
Education for All.
34. He recalled that United Nations had undergone a remarkable operational expansion
in a wide range of fields covered by its specialized agencies and programmes. In 2004
the United Nations system technical cooperation expenditures reached the record
figure of 10 billion dollars, with WFP, UNDP, UNICEF and UNFPA topping the
Document A/55/L.2, GA Resolution on MDG, I Values and Principles, Par. 5