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

73.3 Going to the matter of the National Commissions, I still note from the discussion that there seems to be
some inequity in the manner in which the matter was dealt with by the Legal Committee. As Secretary-General of
a National Commission I am extremely upset, because it seems to me that matters that relate to big States are
given, shall I say, preference. Larger States which support themselves do not perhaps need the assistance of
UNESCO’s Legal Committee, but smaller States like Belize would certainly like to find out why this particular
resolution cannot be accepted, whereas the Statutes say that the General Conference may revise the Statutes.
74. The PRESIDENT:
Thank you. We have noted your comments and your support for the decision with respect to
McDonald’s and Disney. With regard to item 6.6, we will now open the floor to any other speakers, and will then
see if we can find an answer to those questions. I give the floor to the representative of Saint Lucia.
75. Ms HEINIS (Saint Lucia):
Thank you, Madam President. I wish to refer to item 6.6 concerning the Draft Statutes of the Standing
Committee of National Commissions for UNESCO. I do not believe that it is really the job of the Legal
Committee to redraft or revise the Statutes of the Standing Committee during this General Conference, because
they already have a heavy work schedule. Saint Lucia believes that the Statutes should have been submitted to the
Executive Board for its consideration, as were the Draft Statutes of the UNESCO Institute for Statistics. The
latter were accepted without difficulty, whereas we faced an impasse over the Draft Statutes of the Standing
Committee. We would like to know why those Statutes were not submitted to the Executive Board in the first
place. As a National Commission Secretary-General myself I do not think that the Secretaries-General on the
Standing Committee necessarily have the expertise to draw up the Statutes. With reference to the
recommendation of Commission I, that the Statutes be revised by the Standing Committee, I believe there is still
a need for those revised Statutes to be considered by the Board. Accordingly Saint Lucia proposes that the
revised Statutes of the Standing Committee be submitted to the Executive Board. We would like to see this
proposal reflected in the report. Thank you, Madam President.
76. The PRESIDENT:
Thank you, Saint Lucia, for your very pertinent remarks. We note your proposal and will ensure that it is
included in the report. I now give the floor to the representative of Turkey.
77.1 Mr FIRAT (Turkey):
Thank you, Madam President. I would like to make a few comments about the Standing Committee
issue. As far as I know, the Standing Committee Statutes were prepared early last May, so there was enough time
to submit them to the Executive Board. But they preferred to submit them directly to the General Conference, so
there was no opportunity for the Executive Board or any other body to study the Draft Statutes. They were trying
to take a kind of a short cut. Secondly, it was explained in the Legal Committee, which we attended, that the
Secretaries-General of the National Commissions would submit their report to the Director-General of UNESCO.
Does that procedure have a legal basis and is it feasible? As we know, the National Commissions are consultative
bodies, established in each country. In many countries they already have such statutes and the question as to
whether it is legally possible for them to submit their reports directly to the Director-General is another issue that
needs to be studied. In my view, it is not legally possible for them to do that.
77.2 In order to take a decision in depth - and the Legal Committee did not have enough time to study the
question in depth - we also need to check previous General Conference decisions and resolutions in this respect,
if there are any, to see whether the new Statutes are consistent with them. In addition to previous decisions of the
General Conference there might be other statutes relevant to the new Statutes of the Standing Committee. So I
think that from both a legal and a technical point of view, there is work to be done. For that reason we too are in
favour of transmitting the text of these Statutes to the Executive Board. We do not want to create an organ with
faulty statutes because that would not be in the interest of any of us. Thank you.
78. The PRESIDENT:
Thank you very much for your information, which was very useful, I think, in the context of this debate.
And we note your question with respect to the legality of the position of National Commissions reporting directly
to the Director-General, and your support for the proposal to forward the Statutes to the Executive Board for
examination. I now give the floor to the representative of Germany, followed by Chile.
79. Mr HÜFNER (Germany):
Thank you very much, Madam President. With regard to the Standing Committee, we had a very
detailed debate in Commission I, and I think there was a clear understanding, which is fully in line with what has
been said by Saint Lucia and Turkey, namely that (a) the Standing Committee is continuing its work, that (b) the
Statutes have to be revised, that (c) the revised version has to go first of all to the Executive Board, and that (d) it
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