UNESCO. General Conference; 30th; Records ... - unesdoc - Unesco

DEBAT DE POLITIQUE GENERALE (suite)
GENERAL POLICY DEBATE (continued)
DEBATE DE POLÍTICA GENERAL (continuación)
ОБСУЖДЕНИЕ ВОПРОСОВ ОБЩЕЙ ПОЛИТИКИ (продолжение)
1.1 The PRESIDENT:
Ladies and gentlemen, I declare open the sixth plenary meeting. However, before we continue the
general policy debate, I would like to remind you again of the importance of limiting your interventions to eight
minutes, which is the equivalent of approximately four pages. As in the past, heads of delegations speaking in the
general policy debate who wish to provide a full version of their oral statement may request the President to have
written texts of up to 2,000 words appended to the verbatim record of the plenary meeting. I beseech you to
respect the time limit in your oral presentation. We ought to respect the limits we have set for ourselves. Indeed,
it is a sign of democracy to abide by rules that we ourselves have established. Thank you for your attention.
1.2 I now have the pleasure of announcing the first speaker of this afternoon, Her Excellency Mrs Ingegerd
Wärnersson, Minister for School and Adult Education of Sweden. Your Excellency, you have the floor.
2.1 Ms WÄRNERSSON (Sweden):
Madam President, let me start by congratulating you upon your election to this important task. We know
that you are very well suited for this job and we wish you all success in your work. I shall not comment on details
in the Draft Programme and Budget as I know that the Swedish delegation will give their views during the
debates in the commissions.
2.2 UNESCO is undergoing a constant process of reform. The work to prepare the next Medium-Term
Strategy should therefore be given high priority. That document can help in drawing up a more concentrated and
better-defined role for UNESCO. In our view UNESCO has five important tasks to fulfil within its programmes:
it should be forward-looking, should serve as an information and documentation centre, should help in building
capacity, should inform the world about its activities so as to increase its visibility and, finally, it should fulfil its
ethical mission.
2.3 We witness today – in many countries and in certain groups – a complete lack of understanding and
respect for the democratic way of life. Far too many young people do not respect the equal value of human
beings, resorting to actions such as bullying, sexual harassment, violence and xenophobia. This happens in
schools, many of which have difficulties combating these attitudes. In response to this, Sweden has started a
nation-wide project in which basic values are discussed in school. Basic values deal with relations between
people and how we treat and see each other as children and adults. It is thus a pedagogical issue requiring
knowledge and competence and concerns the activity of the school as a whole. But the process of learning and
personal development are not two distinct activities that can be handled separately. Therefore, the inculcation of
basic values is a permanent process which involves everyone in the school and requires the school to cooperate
with other parts of society.
2.4 One of the most important tasks for UNESCO is to promote the teaching of human rights and basic
values. The Organization has a leading role within the United Nations system in the crusade against intolerance.
We know that these issues were also brought up in the report by the International Commission on Education for
the Twenty-first Century. Sweden has always shown a great interest in UNESCO’s activities relating to special
needs education for children as well as for adults. We believe that UNESCO can – as indeed it does – play an
important role in ensuring that decision-makers and the public at large are better informed about special needs
education. This falls clearly within UNESCO’s educational and ethical mandate.
2.5 The reports from UNESCO’s international commissions, such as the Delors and the Perez de Cuellar
Commissions, help in fulfilling UNESCO’s forward-looking task, but it is just as important for such reports to be
given a proper place and a through follow-up. Last year the Swedish Government hosted the big UNESCO
Conference on Cultural Policies for Development. The Conference was part of the political mission and we now
see how it is going to be followed-up through activities of a more capacity-building character. Some weeks ago,
the Swedish National Commission for UNESCO hosted an international workshop where the participants
discussed the more concrete aspects of the follow-up of the Action Plan of the Conference. We sincerely hope
that the World Conference on Science, held in Budapest this summer, will be given the same kind of follow-up.
2.6 Madam President, Sweden welcomes the inclusion of a special item concerning the United Nations Year
of Dialogue among Civilizations on the agenda of this General Conference. My country has for a long time
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