General Assembly: Ad Hoc Working Group (AHWG) on the Revitalization of the Work of the General Assembly, 4th meeting, 79th session

Good morning, dear colleagues. I call to order this meeting of the ad hoc group on revitalization of the General Assembly. This meeting, I have to tell you from the beginning, will have 2 segments. We'll have this interactive dialogue between missions and the Secretariat as mandated by Resolution 71/323 and also reiterated in Resolution 77/335. We have it every year and it's a very good dialogue. And of course, after this segment, uh, in which we'll be hearing from senior officials from the Secretariat, we will be transitioning towards the second segment, which will be linked to the draft resolution that we have submitted on, on, on this group. on the work of this group, but we'll treat that completely separately from, from this segment. So in this segment, we'll be hearing from our colleagues from the Secretariat. You'll get a chance to comment and to ask questions, and of course our colleagues will be addressing those. And only afterwards we'll be dealing with the draft resolution. So I'm very pleased to welcome and appreciate the presence of our dear colleagues from the Secretariat. Mr. Moses Abelian, Under-Secretary-General for General Assembly and Conference Management. Mr. Atul Kharé, Under-Secretary-General for Operational Support. Mr. Bernardo Mariano Jr., Assistant Secretary-General and Chief Information Technology Officer. Mrs. Maria Acosta, Deputy Comptroller. Mr. Ian Phillips, Director of the News and Media Division of the Department of Global Communications, and Mr. Michael Brown, Chief of Security and Safety Services of the Department of Safety and Security. As usually, we do expect and encourage member states to engage with our colleagues from the Secretariat. It's a good opportunity. That's exactly the aim of this interactive dialogue, to improve the work of the Secretariat, but also to provide member states an opportunity to offer feedback in identifying solutions to our needs, to the requirements of the permanent missions, and how to improve the standard operating procedures at the United Nations Headquarters. And now, as I said, we will be listening to our colleagues from the Secretariat, and after that we'll open the floor to Member States for comments and questions. And I have now the pleasure to give the floor to Mr. Atul Kari, Under-Secretary-General for Operational Support. Mr. Kari, you have the floor, please.

Thank you. Distinguished Co-Chairs, Permanent Representative Colonel Feruta of Romania and Permanent Representative Ms. Matheo-Joyne of South Africa, Members of the Ad Hoc Working Group on Revitalization of the Work of the General Assembly. I am pleased to brief you today on recent and ongoing work undertaken by the Department of Operational Support. Let me begin with our continued commitment to accessibility at the United Nations Headquarters. As mentioned last year, following on the improvements completed in 2023 and 2024, we have now undertaken a building-wide assessment of accessibility to identify further opportunities for enhancing the experience of persons with disabilities. This comprehensive assessment will serve as the foundation for a multi-year program currently under development, with funding requirements to be requested for implementation. Turning to the General Assembly Hall, I am pleased to report that the designs for replacement of its outdated lighting fixtures have been finalized. The new design will incorporate energy-efficient and reliable LED lighting, And the project will also include the replacement of furniture and carpeting. However, due to ongoing liquidity constraints, implementation is only expected in 2027 or even 2028, depending upon the identification of necessary funding. On space and facilities, I am pleased to report that the new lease for UNDC-2 was signed in February of this year. The agreement covers a 15-year term with 2 additional 5-year extension options. The Secretariat, along with the DC Corporation, has launched renovations across all 26 floors of the building which are needed to make the building fit for purpose during this new lease period. The renovation process is already underway and is proceeding in parallel with the core building upgrades being conducted by the landlord. The Facilities and Commercial Activities Service has also initiated discussions with relevant departments to assess and meet future space requirements. Through this renovation, we intend to further reduce the commercial office space portfolio, leading to significant savings and cost avoidance for Member States. In relation to the Child Care Center, discussions are ongoing with the newly established Board to assess the potential reopening of the Center in the 2nd floor of UNDC II building. However, due to current construction work, the landlord has raised safety concerns about having the Centre operational during ongoing renovations. We continue to review this matter, and I assure you that DOS stands ready to provide support and to try to find solutions, while noting the parameters set out by you, the Member States, that the UN should play no official role in the establishment of the Centre. With respect to catering, as indicated last year, the Secretariat launched a new multi-stage request for proposal process in February 2024 following a failed solicitation in 2023. The multi-stage process has allowed for competitive dialogue and greater flexibility. 5 strong proposals are currently under review. Technical and commercial evaluations have been completed and negotiations are ongoing. with the participation and support of the Office of Legal Affairs. The existing contract with Kulinarth has been extended through 30 June of this year and may be extended further just to ensure continuity. We anticipate finalizing the new contract in the summer of this year. That said, as the General Assembly has indicated that the catering service is to be, to the extent possible, income-generating, some adjustments have become necessary to reduce the necessary level of subsidy which was approved at $1.3 million The total subsidy in 2024 was $2.1 million, which is simply not sustainable in the current financial situation. A general 5% increase will be applied to most items, with a higher increase on 15 of the most popular items across the cafeterias. In addition, the North Delegates Lounge will now close at 5 PM, and Café de la Paix will close from July to December 2025.

Thank you.

These are not decisions that we take lightly. Prices remained frozen for 3 years during the pandemic despite rising inflation and labor costs. Selective adjustments now allow us to maintain a degree of affordability while managing sustainability. DOS remains committed to supporting the work of the General Assembly. However, unless there is a substantive improvement in the current financial liquidity situation, challenges will persist in adversely affecting operations. This may result in further suspension of preventative maintenance activities and necessitate the reduction of services to a minimum essential level. I want to add that this time we have taken precaution not to stop the escalators from the ground floor to the 4th floor and to make sure that the elevators continue to work. So we will maintain the minimum services that are required for efficient working of the General Assembly and the Member States. On ICT matters, DOS and the Office of Information Communication Technologies are committed to ensuring the efficient delivery of services that enable the UN system to operate effectively. This includes daily interactions that missions have with the Secretariat offices, both physically and digitally. To this end, we have made targeted investments to modernize the UN Headquarters campus to better serve the Member States. My colleague, ESG Mariano, will be speaking to this directly and sharing more details. Finally, co-chairs, distinguished delegates, and colleagues, I would like to thank you for your continued engagement and support. I look forward to your questions and comments.

Thank you.

Thank you very much, Under-Secretary. And of course, if you need quality control for the catering services, I think this group, the ad hoc group, could make some sacrifices. I know this is an issue of interest for member states in general, and I'm very glad that you opened it. We continue now with Mr. Bernardo Mariano Jr., Assistant Secretary General and Chief Information Technology Officer. You have the floor, sir, please.

Thank you, co-chair, distinguished co-chairs, permanent representatives, and members of the ad hoc working group. It is a pleasure to brief you today on the work of the Office of Information and Communication Technology. ICT continues to drive— to be a main driver in response to General Assembly Resolution 77/335 aimed at improving the work of the Secretariat and the interactions with the Permanent Missions in these— in your important work. As such, OICT is committed and continues to enhance services with your support. To improve the technologies in the UN campus and the capacities in the intergovernmental conference rooms, focusing on urgent priorities upgrades. The latest update includes the upgrade of the Wi-Fi services. I still remember some 2 years ago Wi-Fi was a big issue, was not working effectively, so happy to report that We concluded the upgrade in the GAA Hall, ECOSOC, Trusteeship Council, Security Council, and the delegate areas of common spaces. We also made improvements in the mobile signal coverage inside the building and have implemented measures to ensure consistent connectivity throughout the campus. In terms of Additional ICT upgrades in the meeting rooms. We concluded the completion of the podium upgrades on Conference Room 9, 11, and 12, replacement of large projectors in Conference Room 2, Trusteeship Council, and as well as Security Council, refurbishment of some of the cameras across the multiple rooms. namely Conference Rooms 5 to 12, as well as the Security Council. And also we did the replacement of video displays and public address cards and the backup audio recording devices that work in the background to ensure that the quality of the videos is broadcasted accordingly. So while the infrastructure modernization continues, we will continue to prioritize upgrades of ICT services that directly impact the member states, considering that the, the, the resources that we have are not sufficient to cover all the upgrades that we need. So we continue to, to, to prioritize that, and, and, and we will also look— continue to prioritize on the digital content platforms and website used by Member States to ensure that it's aligned with United Nations Disability and Inclusion Strategy. In this regard, in 2024, OICT migrated the legacy system Official Document System, namely ODS, to an open-source technology used— and used this opportunity to modernize the platform with a strong focus on accessibility. That system used to run on Lotus Notes, for those who have been long time in the Secretariat. So we happily migrated from that legacy system to a more modern system and then leveraged also open source to ensure that we address the cost drivers of that investment. That improved the accessibility and we enhanced features for performance. As well as search and multilingualism. To support Secretariat digital content managers, OICT together with DOS as well as DGC have provided digital accessibility resources and online training to Secretariat staff. Finally, OICT continues to co-chair the Digital Technology Network Group that is part of the High-Level Committee on Management. on Digital Accessibility Working Group, together with the World Health Organization, to harmonize and accelerate system-wide implementation of digital inclusion and digital accessibility. The OECD will continue to support your call for improvements in digital accessibility of the UN documents and services.

Thank you.

Thank you, Assistant Secretary-General. And now I would like to give the floor to Mrs. Maria Costa, Deputy Comptroller. Mrs. Costa, you have the floor, please.

Thank you very much indeed. Thank you, Excellencies, co-chairs, distinguished delegates, and colleagues. Thank you for this— the opportunity to engage on pertinent issues of interest to the ad hoc working group on the revitalization of the work of the General Assembly. I'd like to begin by thanking the co-chairs for convening this meeting and for inviting the DMSPC— sorry, our department rather— to brief you. I bring greetings on behalf of the Under-Secretary-General, Catherine Pollard, and wish to convey her deep appreciation for your engagements and her regrets for not being able to be here with you today. As you continue your efforts towards the revitalization of the committee, we use this opportunity to update you on the UNHCR Initiative, which aligns the Secretary-General's visions and his briefings to the General Assembly on this initiative. As you're aware, the Secretary-General has called on us to use the UN's 80th anniversary as an opportunity to reflect and take action, ensuring that the organization remains effective, relevant, and capable on delivering its mandates amidst rising financial pressures, operational complexities, and growing demands from new Member States. Let me recall the context for this ongoing work. It's structured into 3 work streams led by task forces. The UN80 initiative focuses on improving operational efficiencies within existing arrangements, reviewing how mandates are implemented without altering them, and exploring deeper structural reforms and programme realignment across the UN system. The Working Group on Efficiencies has been meeting consistently over the past 2 months Its focus is on identifying concrete and actionable proposals to improve the way we deliver core— on core administrative and operational services at lower cost, with better performance, and with more strategic use of resources. Some of the areas where the working group has developed proposals include consolidating fragmented functions, especially in areas like HR administration, payroll, procurement, procurement, ICT, and travel; creating a common administrative platform for core support services, with pilot discussions underway in New York, Geneva, Bangkok, Beirut, and Entebbe; standardizing and relocating back-office services to lower-cost duty stations where appropriate and where continuity of service and security of operations can be maintained. Professionalising recruitment and learning functions, with proposals to centralise assessment and skills development hubs, expanding the use of automation and data analytics to reduce manual repetitive tasks and free up staff time for value-added work. Also exploring demand-based service delivery models, including pooled or shared service arrangements, to avoid duplication across Proposals from other work streams under the task force will be submitted in future reports and budgets, depending on the type of proposals. Excellencies, co-chairs, distinguished delegates, it is our intention to provide routine updates and briefings to all relevant stakeholders on all these processes as we move forward, and we welcome the support of, of the members of this ad hoc working group because these interactive dialogues are valuable interactions that help ensure that our services as a Secretariat are closely aligned with the needs and the priorities of Member States to enhance effectiveness and responsiveness. Before I conclude, I would also like to provide an update on our efforts to advance the goals of equitable geographical distribution and gender parity in the Secretariat. The General Assembly in 2023 decided to expand the base of posts posts falling under the system of desirable ranges from 3,813 to 5,102, and this taking effect on 1 January 2024. As of February 2025, the number of geographical posts stands at 5,165. The number of Member States within the desirable range category has improved from 103 in 2023 to 128 in April 2025. The number of unrepresented and underrepresented Member States has reduced, with 20 now falling in the unrepresented category and 21 in the underrepresented. Now, while the liquidity crisis has impacted our— has impacted our ability to recruit, including against vacant geographical posts, The Secretariat continues to pursue purposeful partnerships and targeted outreach efforts with Member States to create awareness of opportunities at the United Nations. In parallel, the Organization is preparing to launch an updated strategy for equitable geographical distribution. The strategy will aim to bring unrepresented and underrepresented Member States within range, as well as addressing structural and systematic barriers that might contribute to disparities. In terms of gender, the UN Secretariat remains on track to achieve gender parity by 2028. Women's representation in professional and higher and field service categories has steadily increased from 42.2% in 2021 to 46% in April 2025. Despite the pro— despite this progress, significant challenges persist, particularly in peacekeeping operations, special political missions, and E-classified duty stations, where attracting and retaining women remains difficult. Gender parity efforts in these settings have been further hampered by the current financial constraints. Now, the Secretariat remains committed to advancing equitable geographical distribution and gender parity in the shortfall nonetheless. Thank you very much, ladies and gentlemen. I'm at your disposal to answer questions. Thank you.

Thank the Deputy Comptroller. And we continue, and I give the floor now to Mr. Jan Phillips, Director of the News and Media Division of the Department of Global Communications. Mr. Phillips, you have the floor.

Thank you, Co-Chair. Co-Chairs, Excellencies, distinguished delegates, I'm honored to have the opportunity to address you on behalf of Under-Secretary-General Melissa Fleming and to brief you on the Department of Global Communications' contribution to this important mandate. We're all aware that multilateralism is the only way forward in addressing global issues, and this means that the General Assembly's role is more important today than ever. And from the perspective of Global Communications, It has to be said that we are working in a challenging information environment that is filled with myths and disinformation. We are also working within the UN80 reform initiatives, which will certainly impact how we do our work. Today's challenges must be met with innovation, creativity, and guided by information integrity. Distinguished delegates, while we are endeavoring to find new cost-effective ways to continue our work, and raise awareness about the Assembly's work, I would be remiss to not fully acknowledge that the liquidity crisis is affecting equipment, licenses, and our staffing, which all in turn have implications on our ability to produce effectively everything we would like to. We will have to strategically prioritize our programs, products, and services, and work through technological obstacles. Like all of our colleagues, the department is looking to better serve the mandates that have been given to us, and we rely on your support as we explore and deploy new ways of delivering information. From our metrics and analytics, we know there is a great deal of global interest in the Assembly's work and priorities. We see this in our social media followers— some 77 million across platforms and languages for the Organization's official accounts. We see it in visits to the websites we maintain on UN.org, In the live television points we set up last year to give national broadcasters better visibility of the GA session during High-Level Week. We see it in the number of journalists who come to cover the Assembly session. Last year, some 3,000 external media came. And of the 750 Assembly-related videos we posted on UN Web TV and YouTube last year, we recorded 89 million minutes of watch time. We are working across platforms and across the world to provide impartial, comprehensive, timely, and accessible information to the public in many languages on the tasks and responsibilities of the General Assembly all year round. We are working with university partners and the next generation. For example, our Information Centres organized 39 Model UN meetings in the past year in 13 languages and attended by approximately 16,000 students. DGC is also working with new technology to support and improve multilingual content creation to help us get more information out there in more languages in a timely manner. We are looking at ways to harmonize our digital presence to avoid duplication and tailor content better for global audiences, as we are simultaneously reaching general audiences and media partners from television to print. We need your support as we do this and ask for your partnership and flexibility to better spotlight the important work of the General Assembly. The Department will continue to be guided by you, the Member States, as we go forward. We look forward to continuing our dialogue and collaboration.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Phillips. And now I give the floor to Mr. Moses Abelian. and the Secretary-General for General Assembly and Conference Management. Mr. Abelian, you have the floor, please.

Distinguished co-chairs, distinguished delegates, good morning. It is always a pleasure to be with you. I'll keep my remarks brief as we have been in regular contact since last year's interactive dialogue. I would like to use this opportunity to update you on some of the work that my department has been doing, as well as on 2 items from the General Assembly Resolution 77335 on the revitalization work of General Assembly that have not yet been implemented. Department of General Assembly and Conference Management is now actively reusing information recorded during intergovernmental proceedings to produce documents and other outputs. For all formal meetings of the General Assembly and Economic Social Council, proceeding-related data is recorded before, during, and after the meeting and integrated into one overall structure. This structure has been made available not only to other systems supported by the JECM but is also accessible to all other departments. Implementing data-oriented approach in our work is in line with the Secretary-General's data strategy and not only benefits the Secretariat. It supports the delivery of timely, high-quality services to member states. It enables automatic updates to existing documents and the much earlier release of compilations during the session. Moreover, this approach allows us to automatically push information to the iGov portal which gives Member States easier access to the data that Secretariat records. As outlined in recent budget proposals, the JSCM is facilitating multilingual deliberations through the fully automated speech-to-text project, which is piloted in Geneva. This project uses the technological advances in the field of automatic speech recognition to produce searchable transcripts of the meetings proceedings. The Secretariat continues to prototype such solutions. Since 2019, our staff have been collecting training data and collaborating with the World Intellectual Property Organization to retrain that entity's proprietary speech-to-text system for improved recognition of United Nations domain terminology, diverse accents, and multilingual speakers. As you're aware, the work of the Secretariat is being impacted by the ongoing liquidity constraints. While we continue investing in efficiency of its support to deliberations and decision-making of Member States, the timeline for the implementation of specific requests is being affected. This includes the request contained in Resolution 77335 to create a web form hosted on eDelegate for registering reasonable accommodation requests. Owing to the liquidity crisis, our efforts to advance these have been delayed, although we fully recognize its importance. We'll continue to seek how we can do this within the reduced resources we have. In this context, the Secretariat has observed an increasing trend in resolutions requesting the implementation of new activities and mandates, quote, within existing resources. Regrettably, we co-chairs, given the organization's current financial constraints, this approach is also not feasible. Let me briefly refer to paragraph 94 of Resolution 77335. In that paragraph, the Assembly requested the Secretariat to issue during the 79th session, again within existing resources, in coordination with the Office of the President of General Assembly, compendium of best practices of past presidents that could serve to contribute to strengthening the institutional memory of the office. As I've said last year and then this year on the interactive dialogue, I would like to bring to attention member states that this request is not implementable. It is not within Secretariat's purview to determine which are the best practices of past presidents. It's only member states can express such views.

Thank you.

Accordingly, co-chairs would like to suggest that upcoming draft resolution of ad hoc working group on revitalization, which you will be considering in due course, perhaps could incorporate language that can be implementable. We are not in a position to issue such a compendium, not are we best placed to assess or determine what may constitute best practice or past precedents, and do not want Unfortunately, this can lead to continued expectations that are not possible to fulfill. And in closing, co-chairs and distinguished delegates, I would like to assure you that the JCM remains committed to supporting the work of the General Assembly, ECOSOC, and other bodies in their work, including all co-facilitator-led processes. I look forward to any comments you may wish to share, and thank you for your attention.

Thank you very much, USG. And indeed, on the point that you made regarding the repository of practice and lessons learned, I do remember that indeed you made a point last year in the same interactive dialogue. We kept quite a close look at this issue, and now in this draft resolution, we place the responsibility on the President of the General Assembly and the Office of the President of the General Assembly indeed, and to make use of their own mechanisms, tools, to indeed make use of these practices and lessons learned. So that's a point well taken. And now we have concluded the presentation from our colleagues from the Secretariat, and we will open the floor for comments and questions from delegations. There is no pre-established order, as you know. I would just invite you to press the microphone, and we have several delegations already. I give the floor to the distinguished representative of the European Union. You have the floor, please.

Thank you, Chair, co-chairs, distinguished representatives of the Secretariat, colleagues. I have the honor to speak on behalf of the European Union and its member states. We welcome this interactive dialogue as a valuable opportunity to strengthen our collective efforts towards a more effective, transparent, and accountable General Assembly. We thank the representative of the Secretariat for your valuable insights shared today from your respective departments. And with that in mind, we would like to, for the sake of this interactive dialogue, We would like to kindly ask the following questions. First, what is the Secretariat's implementation plan for the Digital Handbook on General Assembly Practices, and how frequently is it updated? Second, how many high-level meetings of the General Assembly are convened each session? Third, as a follow-up to the voluntary pledge to limit side events adopted as Annex 2 of Resolution 77/335, is there a consolidated list of side events convened during each session? What steps is the Secretariat currently taking to ensure that increased reliance on digital tools promotes inclusivity, especially for smaller delegations and also for persons with disabilities? Another question: What are the preliminary outcomes of the assessment regarding the impact of additional regular budget allocation to the OPGA? What further support mechanisms are being considered to enhance its institutional capacity? And lastly, a question on multilingualism. Can the Secretariat please elaborate on its role in the Task Force for Multilingualism established by the current PGA and on the possible ways and means to expand and reinforce the corresponding action plan for multilingualism? Thank you.

I thank the European Union for the comments and for the questions. questions and we'll take several more interventions. I have Algeria on behalf of them and then Russian Federation and Saudi Arabia. Algeria, you have the floor, please.

Thank you, Mr. President. I have the honor to deliver these remarks and questions on behalf of the non-aligned movement and to express our views and pose several questions within the framework of this interactive informal dialogue with the United Nations Secretariat on the revitalization of the work of the General Assembly, particularly in the context of the UNAT initiative which entails structural reform and budgetary reduction. These comments and questions were sent in advance to the Secretariat. Also, the NAM would like to thank the co-facilitator, Ambassador Matthew Joyini, Permanent Representative of South Africa, and Ambassador Cornel Verhoefstadt, Ambassador Permanent Representative of Romania for convening this exchange between the Permanent Mission and the Secretariat, offering a valuable opportunity to address various, various issues concerning the improvement of our future work within the General Assembly. Allow me also to express our appreciation to the senior representative of the UN Secretariat for their participation in this dialogue today. Vietnam reaffirms its commitment to a strong, inclusive, balanced, and fully functional United Nations in all of its core pillars. In this regard, we would like to offer the following key observations and questions. First, concerning implementation of resolution on revitalization of the work of the General Assembly, we commend the effort undertaken by the Secretariat to implement the decisions of the General Assembly related to the revitalization of its work and to ensure the smooth organization of meeting and related activities. However, there is a clear need to conduct an in-depth evaluation of the implementation status of the relevant General Assembly resolutions in order to identify underlying causes of delays or non-implementation and progressively remove the strains preventing the full potential of the revitalization process from being realized. We have the questions about this issue. What measures have been adopted by the Secretariat in coordination with the Office of the President of the General Assembly to support the effective implementation of these resolutions? Will we acknowledge progress reported by the Secretariat? The NAM encourages the Secretariat to share correct suggestions or proposals with member states that could assist in advancing the implementation of General Assembly revitalization measures. Second point, multilingualism and language equality. The Nam attaches the utmost importance to multilingualism, a core value of the United Nations. We welcome ongoing digitalization efforts while calling for enhanced proactive dissemination of documents in all 6 languages. Regarding multilingualism, we have 2 questions. Are they— are there any planned improvements to ensure the simultaneous availability of documents in all 6 official languages? What concrete steps is the Secretariat taking to promote multilingualism on an equal footing? We also underscore the importance of UN press releases, which must accurately and impartially reflect the positions expressed by all Member States. What safeguards has the Secretariat established to ensure impartiality and equal treatment of all Member States' views in UN press coverage? Third, regarding side events during the general debates, The NAM recalls that the General Debate of the General Assembly is a politically significant occasion during which all member states should be able to express their views with solemnity, visibility, and attention befitting universal multilateralism. In that spirit, various resolutions on revitalization have encouraged the limitation of side events during High-Level Week in order to preserve the institutional impact and political gravitas of this foundational moment? What operational guidelines has the Secretariat put in place to ensure a coherent and fair regulation of parallel events organized by the UN system entities? During this period? Also, in relation with these questions, what steps have been taken to encourage these entities to adhere to the voluntary commitment to refrain from holding parallel events during the General Debate? Fourth, equitable Geographical representation. Its principle is very important for the NAM. Despite several resolutions adopted since 1990, equitable geographical representation, especially in senior positions within the Secretariat, remains inadequate. Some leadership functions continue to appear concentrated among certain nationalities, regions. What obstacles persist in the full implementation of Article 101 of the Charter regarding both competence and equitable geographical distribution? 5th, UNAT Initiative, SDGs, and a budget impact. All these points are related. The NAM seeks clarity on how the UNAT Initiative aligns with the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. and which thematic priority will guide the Secretariat's strategic planning for the upcoming cycle. We have 2 questions. How does the Secretariat intend to align the implementation of the UNAID with the achievement of SDGs? What are the priority themes identified for the next strategic planning cycle? Regarding the financial implications, how will the Secretariat ensure that cost reductions do not come at the expense of equitable geographical representation, particularly for developing countries, in the Secretariat workforce? Has an impact assessment been undertaken to evaluate the regional and personal-level consequences of anticipated post-reductions. The last point, it's mandated function and the OPGA. The NAM is concerned with ensuring the mandated functions by the General Assembly remain fully funded and operational even in the context of reform and budget streaming. Have objective criteria been defined to determine which areas may be rationalized without compromising the fundamental mandates of the General Assembly? With regard to the office of the President of the General Assembly, the NAM underscores the need to provide it with stronger and more sustainable institutional support to enable it to carry out its increasingly complex functions with impartiality, effectiveness, and independence? What provision does the Secretariat envisage under the UNAT initiative to ensure stable, sufficient, and predictable budgetary and logistical support for the OPGA while avoiding excessive reliance on extra-budgetary funding. In conclusion, the Non-Aligned Movement reiterates its commitment to an effective, inclusive, and transparent multilateralism. We thank the Secretariat for its openness to dialogue and encourage the continuation and deepening of these exchanges, including through more regular and open consultation with member states in order to help ensure the follow-up of the implementation of measures undertaken by the Secretariat. I thank you.

I thank Algeria on behalf of the Non-Aligned Movement, and I give the floor now to the Russian Federation, to be followed by Saudi Arabia and then Portugal. the Russian Federation, please, madam.

Distinguished co-chairs, we welcome the convening of today's meeting of the working group in an interactive dialogue format between permanent representatives of member states and the Secretariat. We believe that this practice is highly useful in order to eliminate any potential shortcomings in the work of the Secretariat and optimize the work of the General Assembly, especially in the context of the liquidity crisis and an evident overload of work of the body. As we look forward to the new GA resolution on revitalization, we would like to seek the Secretariat's view regarding a few ideas that are currently circulating. First of all, we would like to hear your views on how the Secretariat understands the interlinkage between the UNAID initiative and the revitalization process? And the second question relates to the long-term implementation of the resolution. Could you please comment on the status of those GA resolutions that were adopted many years ago on a one-time basis and did not have any reservations about the resolution ceasing to be in effect. However, there is confirmed information on the fact that the operative sphere of activities of such resolutions would not fully address in terms of its full implementation by the member state to which it was addressed. Third, could you please tell us the status at this stage of ensuring the principle of multilingualism in the context of the economy measures introduced by the Secretariat. Fourth, during an unofficial informal meeting of the General Assembly in May, the Secretary-General announced that the Secretariat does not plan to interfere in member states' affairs when it comes to mandate overviews. Is this in fact accurate?

Yes.

Fifth, we frequently hear calls to do everything possible to introduce gender-based amendments into staff rules and rules of procedure. How would this affect the legal status of various translations into the 6 official UN languages, and how can we ensure that these 6 language versions are identical? 6th, we regularly hear Thank you. I have a question about an initiative to introduce the practice of one gavel in the General Assembly, which would mean that resolutions would not be adopted first in the committee and then in plenary, but to be adopted only once. How does the Secretary envision such an approach working in practice? Would it not harm the coherent and uniform process of taking decisions in the General Assembly? The 7th question is about the database regarding the past selection and appointments processes for the Secretary-General. How can the Secretary— what advice can the Secretariat provide for the upcoming cycle? Thank you.

I thank the Russian Federation. I give now the floor to Saudi Arabia. You have the floor, sir, please.

First of all, let me thank the facilitators, South Africa and Romania, for convening this meeting that allows us to shed light on a number of questions linked to the work of the General Assembly. We also thank the representatives of the Secretariat for their presentations. My delegation reiterates its full support for the revitalization of the General Assembly. This is a pillar of reform at the United Nations. Let us take this opportunity to throw some light on the following issues. Firstly, the importance of implementing the resolutions of the GA and the reasons that sometimes prevent such implementation and also the importance of simplifying the work of the GA, especially as regards some redundancy that may exist, the GA should be a forum for representatives of member states to discuss issues. So what measures can be taken in this regard? As regards the UN80 initiative, how is this initiative going to have an impact on work linked to the revitalization of the GA. Also, we'd like to emphasize the need to continue work as member states in following on from what has been adopted to further support efforts to ensure that the GA can fully live up to its role as mandated by the Charter of the UN.

I thank you.

I thank Saudi Arabia for Thank you, Mr. Minister, for the comments. I give now the floor to Portugal. You have the floor, please.

Thank you very much, Ambassador. Thank you, co-chairs, and thank you to the representatives of the Secretariat for this interesting and important briefing. We'd have 3 questions if possible. One is about the action days. So whether the action days are these 2 days that take place right before the general debate starts in the High-Level Week. There were action days at the margins of the Summit of the Future last September. There were also action days the year before at the margins of the SDG Summit. In our view, it allowed to concentrate a range of side events that otherwise would have taken place during the— at the margins of the general debate. Therefore, in our view, it was helpful to ensure due participation of member states, civil society, and the organization of different initiatives, and avoiding, as my colleague from Algeria was mentioning, avoiding that the general debate loses its importance, its due importance. So we see them as a good initiative. So the question here is whether the Secretariat has any type of assessment of this organization of the action days, whether it allowed to concentrate side events that otherwise would have happened in different other days? That's a question. Second question is related to the, the Youth Fellowship in the Office of the PGA. We see it as a very relevant initiative that was started some years ago, I believe 3 or 4 years ago, that allows for diplomats from LLDC countries to have an experience as interns in the office of the PGA. Portugal is a proud contributor to this fellowship as well as through the European Union. My question is whether there is an assessment by the Secretariat on the impact of this program. And what is the financial sustainability that you have for this initiative for the next years, whether it's— whether you have an assessment there as well, which would be helpful. The final question is very simple, related to the repository of the SG selection process. So this was a new repository that was introduced. We were very happy to have this language in the last resolution. It was proposed by Portugal. The repository came to life within existing resources, which was great. And it is now a website where we can see how the last 9 SGs were selected and reconducted in some cases. There's a lot of information. It is great. Just The question is whether for the next SG selection process, this will be the website where we will have the information about the candidates, the joint letters, the vision statements, or whether you will use the websites of the office of the PGA, which would not be our intention. And so just to confirm that this will be the main—

Yes.

hub for information on the SG selection process. Thank you so much.

Thank you, Portugal. Any other delegation wishing to comment or to ask questions at this point? If not, I would, I would say that we go, uh, we go back to our colleagues from the Secretariat and then, uh, oh, we have Kazakhstan. Please go ahead. And you know, those wishing to take the floor after that, Maybe we get this first round, address the comments and the questions, and then we'll take another round from member states. So, but Kazakhstan, please, you have the floor.

Esteemed co-chairs, esteemed representative of the Secretariat, distinguished delegates, excellencies, we express our appreciation for co-chairs to the ad hoc working group. And the Secretariat for the continued commitment to strengthening the role, transparency, efficiency, and the General Assembly. And of course, we appreciate insightful information provided by the representatives of the Secretariat. And already during your reports and information, most of our questions were answered. And some of the questions were already covered by the delegates, and we have left just a few questions, and they'll be very short. Just one question is that, has the Secretariat conducted the preliminary assessment of the impact on the regular budget increase of the OPGA as mandated by Resolution 77/335 and the new draft resolution that is— was tabled and will be presented today. Another question is, would the Secretariat consider supporting the development of a digital repository or knowledge-sharing hub to preserve lessons learned and transition practices among the presidents of the General Assembly. And co-voicing the question of representative of Algeria is that has the Secretariat explored the feasibility of placing the department for General Assembly and Conference Management or any other relevant structures, UN structures, under the administrative supervision of the PGA, with the view of strengthening the mandate and institutional memory of the PGA, improving workflow efficiency, and reducing operational costs. If such a change were deemed beneficial, what procedural budgetary or regulatory steps would be required to implement the reorganization. Thank you.

Thank you very much, Kazakhstan. We'll go to— back to the Secretariat and then we'll take another round if needed. I give the floor to USG Abelian. And then other colleagues may jump in at any point whenever you, you feel the need. Please, you have the floor, Mr. Avellán.

Thank you, co-chair. I'll go through the questions relevant and applicable to the JACM. On the first question of the European Union Secretariat's implementation plan for the digital handbook of General Assembly practices, how frequently is it updated? Uh, co-chairs, that particular digital handbook was launched in August of last year, 2024. So it is less than one year at this stage. And it was the work led by the PGA as requested by the resolution. It was addressed to PGA with assistance of Secretariat, but the main work was done by United Nations University. Of course, we as a Secretariat are ready to assist again any incoming PGA if and when he or she decides to go to revision of that launch of the handbook, and eventually if the United Nations University is ready to engage and to continue working on it. As you may recall also, we had a number of permanent missions who have assisted and helped I will not go in detail, so wait for the launching of such a book. So the word within existing resources, even though was there as a part of the resolution, but of course it didn't happen within existing resources. So that's what I can say on the issue of the handbook. Co-chairs, on the issue of the Question raised, number of high-level meetings. High-level meetings in '78 session, we had 14. '77 session, we had 11. '76 session, we had 15. I will be very honest, number of high-level meetings now are taking place during the high-level week is limited, the number of available rooms we have. I think the number of high-level meetings I think that's— we reached to the stage. For example, we had a high-level mandate given by the General Assembly to have a meeting during the High-Level Week for the Rohingya refugees. We couldn't find any space to accommodate such a thing, so we had to move outside of the High-Level Week. And the issue is not number of high-level meetings. It is the scope of such meetings. If you have a high-level meeting with 3, 4 parallel round tables, it is occupying already 3 rooms. And we have conference room 1, 2, 3, 4, ECOSOC and Trusteeship. So that is our maximum capacity to have a number of high-level meetings. So we do tell co-chairs when they come up with the new ideas for different processes that what is our capacity. Sometimes our views are heard, not always, but that's where we are. So number of high-level meetings is growing. That's the only thing I can say. On the issue of side events, it has been raised by a number of delegations. First of all, on the pledges of member states, We had 36 member states which pledged, signed, and 14 entities of the UN system also pledged. It is not my wish to express view about how the pledging is working, but I can say one thing. Again, number of side events during the high-level week is limited to availability of number of rooms.

Thank you.

That's, I think, I would say that. When we look at the total numbers of the non-calendar events, which are the mainly side events, for last 3 years as a statistics, if I put 3 years ago, that number was in the 4 duty stations, 29,000. 7,000 were the calendar approved by the GA meetings. The rest was non-calendar, which means side events. And again, I'm referring the statistics to 4 duty stations. Because of liquidity, we moved from 7,100 number of calendar meetings to 6,200 last year, and this year will be even less. And the number of side events moved from 29,000 to 27,000 and it is not because of the member states' plan to have less meetings. It is the austerity measures not to have events after 6 o'clock, so that's how it has reduced a couple of thousand. So from that perspective, that's where things are. And pledging, it is a desire, but it is not a solution of reducing off-site events. And I refer to only High-Level Week, but the situation is similar during the Commission on Status of Women. It is the similar situation during the HLPF and all high-level weeks of different meetings we are hosting. And there is no consolidated list of side events because there are a number of side events the organizers do not want to publicize. That's the sovereign right of those organizers. And for the Secretariat, we don't know how many side events also taking place outside of UN premises because that's something we are not aware. So there is no consolidated list and It is those entities which are requesting to publicize, it is appearing the time in the journal. So that's what we are publicizing, what is requested by organizer. On the issue of the digital tools and promoting inclusivity especially, I already made remarks in my introductory comments. But if I put much more bluntly, we put all our technology projects on hold. We don't have resources to make progress on a number of areas, and it is impacting for member states e-delegate or iGOV. It is impacting for the— again, member states for the G-meets that you are doing, the booking. So there are a number of areas which we are in the maintenance mode right now. Chair, I think the question was asked by the different delegations about assessment regarding the impact of additional regular budget allocations. As a Secretariat, I will have difficulty to express a view on the Office of the OPGA about If 4 additional positions added, how has changed? We have to look at the OPGA offices. We used to have OPGA which had 25 staff members, and we used to have OPGA which had 75 staff members. So if in that number 4 people were funded from the regular budget, it's very difficult to say what was the impact. Of course, only each PGA would be able to express their views, how that 4 positions helped them to not to use those resources for the funding what they need, but maybe other purposes. So that's something only OPGA would be in a position to respond. Because we, we do support also other presidents. We have the president of ECOSOC also, and we have the chairs of the main committees. So it is difficult for us to give an assessment for the particular— how 4 positions help. And numbers of the people which are seconded by other departments or member states is going to be— depends on the quality of those individuals, how the PGA feels that they are much more in a better position to express such a view on On the issue of task force of multilingualism, madam co-chairs, when the liquidity crisis happens, the first impacted area, it is the multilingualism and the services member states. If you look at the liquidity crisis 1984, 1994, 1995, 2006, etc. Each case, the measures we are putting austerity measures first and foremost is the impact on multilingualism. So that's number one area. You have seen the CDC's letters which were shared with you on austerity measures. So for me, as a coordinator of the multilingualist, not only the USG of the JACM, it is. Painful to see how we are being impacted. We launched last year our strategic framework for multilingualism. Of course, we are assisting the PGA, and we will be assisting next PGA if the next PGA would like to continue with the task force. And any expansion of reforms associated of Action Plan, what will be within the purview of the PGA, and I will be continuing from the Secretariat side system-wide coordination of the role of multilingualism and the Multilingual Coordinator, whatever we can do in that context. On issue of the effective implementation of the resolutions, a question raised by the distinguished representative of Saudi Arabia. Our role is to fully support and our interactive dialogues what we are having here with member states and our reports which is in the chart showing how we are implementing all of those elements. The chart you will see what has been done and today, for example, I said 2 elements that we are not able to implement for the reasons I explained. So that's how we— where we are. And with the co-chairs, always we are regularly in touch and informing them where things are and why certain things are not happening. But the chart is annually what we are producing for member states to see where things are. And latest chart is in the document A/78/944. On the issue of the concrete suggestion or proposal with member states to assist in advancing implementation of General Assembly revitalization measures, we do as a Secretariat what we are being asked and we report back, but a number of areas of the revitalization resolutions are addressed to member states, not the Secretariat. Of course, you have pledges and the side events and all other things, but this is something I can't speak. But from our side, we very carefully, we go from all our repository of everything and inform back to member states. Again, the issue for multilingualism, planned improvements to ensure simultaneous availability. We issue a report to Secretary-General every year on the pattern of conferences, and it is public document, we issue all the documents simultaneously in 6 languages as a mandate. Unless the bureau or particular body decides to request particular language early release, we do not send anything anywhere without decision of the body concerned. But if you look all our releases, it is 100% simultaneous release of all documents. Of course, there is a delay of submission. The members— author departments submitting to us documents around 92% submission rate. 8% are not doing it in the timely submission. But we have 99% of the timely implementation for all the SLOTEP documents.

Thank you.

On the— we have the parity of all 6 languages based on the official mandates, et cetera. But what we are facing, co-chairs, liquidity is impacting everything, and just to— for the benefit of the membership, When we reduced 10% of meetings for the— with interpretation, what is happening, in order for us to have a full coverage of all the mandated, if required, if available meetings, we would need around 70 meetings per week to take place. Last year, if you recall, we moved to the— from 60 to 63 meetings. This year we moved to 55 meetings. So that is the impact of liquidity. So of course multilingual is impacted. And in order to implement 55, and not having the available cash, only my hope is to ask my colleagues who are sitting in the booth today for them voluntarily to do much more than the norms approved by the General Assembly. That's the only thing I can just say thank you to them every day. But how long it will continue, I can just ask them to do more, I don't know, but this is where we are facing. So that is the interpretation, Sonit, on how the multilingualism is impacting. For the documentation side, what we have achieved— in a normal, without liquidity crisis, we used to produce 250 million words per year in all languages. If I convert that number to number of pages, it is around 2,300 pages per day average. Delegations are receiving in 6 languages, 2,300 pages per day. I don't know how many missions would be in a position to read 2,300 pages documentation in 6 languages, but that is the average number we are giving out. So what has happened with liquidity, we have reduced, as you have seen the communication, we moved from 250 Last year we issued only 222 million words. This year will be even less. And it is another impact to multilingualism. And just for the benefit for everyone, notional cost— again, notional cost for one word in 6 languages is around $3. Doesn't mean that if you use one less word you will get the automatic savings of 3 words, but that is the rates, how we do the PBIs, etc. And national cost of the one-day meeting with interpretation only for the JACM is $12,300. So this is just how the impact of the liquidity crisis impacting the service to member states from that angle. So since I had all delegations talking on multilingual, this is just to show that where impact is coming. I already spoke about the side events and the voluntary commitment also. As an entity which is planning and booking all the side events, we did not see the difference if there was a pledging from member states, one Even less than one quarter have pledged, so I can't say anything. So, but the outcome is the side events, we stop booking when we don't have any more space to do it. So that's the basic criteria. If there is no enforcing mechanism, Secretariat does not have any enforcing mechanism, and we don't want to tell yes or no. Only answer we can provide when we say we don't have any available space, because it is not DJACM, because available space is managed by COLLECT, all of the spaces on USG for Department of Personnel Support, because they are all entities involved. It has to go from DSS to OICT, for DGC, everyone to be involved. So it is the capacity for not only for DJACM, but everyone else involved.

Thank you.

Co-chairs, I think I will not go responding anything about revitalization of UNAIDS. I will leave it to both of you to decide. But if you are going to look anything in the drafting of the resolutions, one thing, I just gave you some statistics about number of reports we are producing, number of meetings that are taking place, so that is something— is it possible to look into those things in the context of revitalization? I will leave it to you. Because it will have a tremendous impact, whatever the Secretary-General's initiative UN80 is, but it is up to member states to look into it, but it is not from our side that we can express any view. On the question raised by distinguished representative of Russian Federation on the long-term implementation resolution, status of those resolutions many years ago, There is a GA resolution, 38227A, which says that adoption of new resolution by the General Assembly will not imply the elimination of existing activities or program carried out as a result of legislative mandates, nor the elimination or reduction of the resources. But if there is a one-time action has been done and implemented, then it will be just in the Records of the General Assembly. But if adopted and it is continuing every year, the document which shows exactly where things are with implementation, it is the— our program plan and budget documents which the budget fascicles showing for mandate for each activity and that is what is being reviewed by the CPC every year. And I already spoke about liquidity and the multilingualism to the question raised again by Russian Federation. On the issue of the gender-based amendments, I will just only say that we as a department of producing document in 6 languages, Gender-inclusive language, it has been in use by DGACM for a long time, but with ensuring that there is a consistency among all languages. So that part is done. Strategies used in all cases comply with the grammar and spelling rules of each official language, and all our products are the public document, and it is only member states can assess and to give us feedback if there is anything which is not matching by the desire or the wish of member states. And so each language has a specificity we have to ensure, but guidelines for the gender-inclusive language— I cannot talk about amendments which was referred by the distinguished representative on Russian Federation. On the issue of the one-gavel, other things, Madam Chair, because you haven't started discussion, so you will be discussing for the draft resolution later, because the question was raised by the distinguished President of Russian Federation about one-gavel approach. And I will not talk about the appointment process at this stage for the— because we are not there yet, and it is 2 bodies of General Assembly But we are there to assist PGA, PGA-elect, whatever the processes would be necessary for the appointment of the Secretary-General. On the impact of UNAID and the revitalization, again, I already spoke. That's, I think, maximum as a Secretary-General. Both me and my colleague Atul Kariya are members of UNAID task force, but I think we are there in our individual capacity. but not as a head of department. So SG has done, I think, briefing. There will be more briefing led by Guy Ryder to the membership at large, so you will hear more on those issues. On the action days, again, it is member states who can express their views, and it was organized by the Executive Office of Secretary-General. That will be something we'll be seeing how the SG and his office will be looking and they would be in a better position to give the assessment and also assessment will be given by member states. And it is up to PGA-elect and next PGA to decide about the youth fellowship program with voluntary contribution of member states for that. in the future. On the repository of the SG selection process, yes, as of now we are looking at that particular website for the repository to have all the processes, but of course the PGA website— I can't speak about the PGA 88th session or 81st session, what they would like to have in their own website, but it will be— we will be advising which information related to it to put in their own respective websites. But what we have, it is repository now that will be used for the future. On the question raised by the distinguished representative of Kazakhstan on the RB increase in OPGA, I already responded, and I already responded also knowledge sharing hub among the OPGAs already. Co-chairs, On the last comment of distinguished representative Kazakhstan, putting DGACM under the leadership of the PGA, I can't picture it yet. PGAs are changing every year and they are not staff members, so I can't say anything about it because it is member states who can make such a judgment and decision of such a thing. And I don't know if any PGA would like to be in charge of 2,000 staff I have in 4 duty stations. If such a PGA exists, I would be very happy to give everything to PGA. Thank you.

Thank you, USG Abelian. USG Karé?

Please, you have the floor.

Thank you, Permanent Representative of Romania, co-chair. First of all, thank you to all delegations who took the floor and gave their views and their questions. Now, most of the questions have been answered in detail by my colleague, USGA Moises Abilian, so I'll just focus on 4 issues. First, Mr. President, you yourself, you mentioned that the member states would be willing to work with us and help with us on the catering issues. I wish to recall that on 19th July, about 2 years ago, 2023, I had sent a formal letter to the co-chairs of the working group requesting for nomination of 5 delegates to form an advisory group of friends on catering with the Secretariat. I wish to recall that request again, reiterate that request if I may. I think we could meet maybe 4 times a year. It is not required to meet every month. And the first meeting would be happy to be co-chaired by the Secretariat, and then the chair of this group of friends could alternate between the member states and the Secretariat, and we'll be ready to provide support. I will be sending a copy of that letter to both the co-chairs again to reiterate my request. We were just coming out of the COVID-19 pandemic, and in 2024 we were all busy discussing the Pact of the Future and our arrangements. So I think maybe it took some time, but maybe this is the time to revive it, to have— because the cafeteria and the catering serves both the Secretariat as also the member states and also the visitors. So I think we need to have full involvement of everybody, and I think Group of Friends is a good mechanism. Second, there was a question which was really asked about Article 101. I will not go into the article. Article is very clear, but more important, I want to go into the question of equitable geographical representation, and my department is responsible for a small component thereof, which is the appointment of un- and underrepresented member state nationals in the geographic posts, and those geographic posts have now been expanded by you. So we have been conducting the tests for the YPP, you know, the Young Professionals Program, and people remain on this YPP roster for a period of 4 years, during which they need to be selected. But now there is a problem with the selection because the there is a freeze on recruitment to all the posts. So therefore, I have decided to extend the duration of the time that these people remain on the roster from un- and underrepresented countries by an equivalent time to take care of the recruitment freeze, because that I think is the most fair system, so that they will have they will not fall off the roster and we continue with the YPP. I also wish to state that at great cost to other reductions in my own department, I have decided to maintain the Managed Reassignment Program, the MRP. So after 2 years, the people who are recruited under the YPP, they are rotated between different departments, different entities. This cost is approximately about $2 million a year, but I have decided to maintain that cost and not reduce it. Sort of ring-fence it because that is important both for rejuvenation and for the career development of those from un- and underrepresented member states who have joined the organization under the YPP program. A third issue which I wanted to mention was the support that we provide to OPGA. Abelia mentioned that OPGAs have different structures in their offices varying from 25 to 75, sometimes even smaller than 25, sometimes slightly bigger than 75. We have— we try to make arrangements for the office space for all the people, no matter what number of people they have. We have even, with their arrangement, converted the space on the 3rd floor of the conference building to a flex working space so that increase in numbers or decrease in numbers can be more easily taken care of. And of course, we provide space to the OPGA during transition when we have to take care of space for 2 offices, if you like. And this happens every year, and we have made arrangements for that. Separately, whenever OPGA travels on official travel, my TTS, the Travel and Transport Service has a VIP desk for making arrangements for the OPGA, and this is the facility which we offer to the PGA in addition to, of course, the Secretary-General and nobody else, not even me. A third issue— a fourth issue, excusez-moi.

Multilingualism, we are continuing to offer learning courses in all the official languages of the United Nations, and we will continue making the greatest effort possible to ensure that these courses can be enjoyed by delegations, members of the delegate permanent missions as well as the Secretariat so that we can make that contribution towards multilingualism, however small. Thank you.

I wonder if other colleagues— yes, the Deputy Controller. ICT first, and then we'll go to the Deputy Controller. Thank you so much.

Please.

Thank you, Chair.

On the question of increasing reliance on digital tools to promote inclusivity, and especially for small delegations and persons with disability, OICT continues to focus its attention to prioritize these features and enterprise tools that are used by member states and the public in general to enhance this accessibility in line with the international web accessibility standards and UN guidance, of course, within constraints of the limited funding, as USG Moses mentioned. In terms of— with regards to intergovernmental meetings, the support of YCT, we always verify from the earliest stage of defining requirements and the procurements that all technologies under the purview of OICT have as a primary factor the accessibility to persons with wide ranges of disabilities. So that includes making sure that the tools have captioning, on-screen displays, sign language capabilities, as well as capabilities for Braille, for instance, features in all conference rooms. So that is something that we continue to pay attention to and put a lot of focus. Induction loops, Bluetooth integrations for all these assistive technologies.

Thank you.

And to the— on the question on the technology that brings to— that provides knowledge-sharing platforms, especially for the PGA, we do have the Microsoft Office 365 that has a standard feature of Teams and then all the capabilities to actually enable that. I think, as USG Abdul Karim mentioned, the transition phase in terms of tools, I think that transition phase between 2 PGAs, it's a question of leveraging on the existing tools to enhance that transition. So, if there is any support needed, that the OECD has been supporting the PGA, incoming PGAs, to get on board with those tools as we requested. But if there's a specific process that will be defined, then we can put that— we'll be more than happy to continue to strengthen that to make sure that that transition and the usage of those tools specifically bring the value to the incoming PGA.

Thank you. Thank you very much, Eiji. Mrs. Costa, please, you have the floor, the Deputy Comptroller.

Thank you very much indeed, distinguished co-chairs. And if I could just address some other questions on behalf of our Department of Management Strategy, Policy, and Compliance. If I could just revert back to— there was a question on equitable geographical representation, reference Article 101 of the Charter, and especially in terms of senior positions within the Secretariat. As Member States are aware, the appointment of senior leaders is one of the most significant responsibilities of the Secretary-General in his capacity as Chief Administrative Officer of the Organization, and he attaches utmost importance to this responsibility, and he exercises the discretion and authority vested in him by the GA with great care for the appointment of senior leaders. To identify the most suitable candidates, the Secretary-General has established a rigorous recruitment and selection process for senior leadership positions, and he's strongly committed to ensuring that senior leaders in the Secretariat are appointed from as wide a geographical base as possible, and that there's gender parity amongst his senior leadership team. He's also deeply committed to transparency and regularly shares information on senior leadership vacancies. And to support these objectives, he launched 4 initiatives during his first term. The first was the Senior Leadership Talent Pool, to broaden and diversify the pool of potential senior leadership candidates. The second was the Senior Leadership Vacancies Portal, and that's to receive nominations from member states and applications from the public for senior leadership positions. The third was the Global Leadership Team webpage, which lists all the senior officials across the Secretariat, Regional Commissions, Field Offices, Funds, Programmes, Country Teams, Research and Training Institutes, and other entities. The last— the fourth and the last one is the Appointments Announcements webpage, which features all senior leadership appointments since the Secretary-General took office, on 1 January 2017. So really, from many angles, to address the transparency in the reporting to make sure that there's fair knowledge available across the globe. There was a question in relation to the UNAIDS initiative, SDGs and budget impacts. Specifically, how does the Secretariat intend to align the implementation of UNAIDS with the achievement of the SDGs. Now, what we'd say in this respect is that the UN80 initiative is designed to make the UN fit for purpose, not only structurally, but in how it delivers support to member states in meeting global commitments. And it's about doing better at delivering on our mandates, better at placing sustainable development at the core of our work. The UN80 initiative explicitly protects and prioritizes development mandates. This includes the 2030 Agenda and regional intergovernmental frameworks such as the Programme of Action for LDCs, LLDCs, and SIDS, as well as Agenda 2063. The unique needs of SIDS, LDCs, and LLDCs will remain front and center, as you can see. Because of that prioritisation. We would also say that the initiative closely aligns with the 2030 Agenda by enhancing the Secretariat's institutional capacity to deliver effectively, and we've got some key alignment measures in place there. The first is to improve efficiency in delivery, and that's about consolidating administrative services that would serve to redirect savings to towards core programme implementation, and that's strengthen mandate delivery, particularly in sustainable development programmes. The second, I would say, is the enhanced field-level impact, and that's relocating functions closer to field operations and regions, and that will serve to enhance the responsiveness to SDG priorities. The third, which I think you you've already heard from distinguished colleagues, is digitization and innovation, which is looking to modernizing operations through digital platforms and innovative approaches, and enhancing data-driven decision-making, which aligns with monitoring and reporting on the SDGs. There was a question also about what are the priority themes identified for the next stage of the strategic planning cycle? And it's a timely question, as ever, at this time of year. We have the plan outline, that's document A/80/6, Plan Outline, which is available, and that's currently in front of the CPC. Now, that document, as all distinguished delegates I'm sure know, provides the 8 priority themes for the next cycle, which is which runs from 2026 through to 2028. I've given you the reference. One can always review that. I ought to note, though, that the priority themes are set by member states, and naturally these remain in place, and if I may say, largely unchanged for several decades. But these documents— the document, the plan outline, is continually updated with referencing to cross-cutting resolutions in each of those areas. So, you have the key themes, the key mandates approved by the General Assembly, and when the General Assembly makes other cross-cutting issues that may have an impact on those, those are reflected in the plan outline, which is available for everyone to review at present. It's publicly out there. All right. If I can If I can turn to the financial implication— financial implications, which I think is at the forefront of most people's minds these days. There was a question on how the Secretariat can ensure that cost reductions do not come at the expense of equitable geographical representation, particularly for developing countries in the Secretariat's workforce. And in that regard, I'd like to mention that the Secretary-General has indicated that attention will be given to this matter in the context of the evolution of the workforce. In addition to that, the instructions issued by my boss, the Comptroller, just recently specify that the proportion of entry-level positions at the P1 and P2 level within the professional and higher category cannot decrease. So, they cannot decrease as part of the upcoming workforce changes, and that will help to preserve the capacity for rejuvenation and the use of YPP rosters for the P2 regular budget post. So, that complements what the, the Under-Secretary-General for Operational Support mentioned earlier. Now, determining which positions will, will be included in cost reductions will be based on the functions of the post, not the people who encumber the posts. So, staff who encumber positions that are affected by cost reductions will be subject to our established downsizing policy, which includes provisions that consider factors as nationality and gender. Thank you. If I may continue, there was another question about Has an impact assessment been undertaken to evaluate the regional and personnel-level consequences of the anticipated post-reductions? I'm going to speak candidly at this point, just to say that the proposals are still under formulation within each entity. It's a— I think it's fair to say it's a complex assessment. It's very nuanced and sensitive. So, at this juncture, we cannot say that an impact assessment has been concluded, but I think it's fair to say throughout every stage of this exercise that's being undertaken by all the heads of entities and their teams, it's front and centre of the proposals that will come forth. And I think— yes, if I may just move on to the mandated functions. and the OPGA. A question was raised by the NAM regarding its concerns of ensuring that the mandated functions by the General Assembly remain fully funded and operational, even in the context of the reform and budget streamlining. So, the specific question was, have objective criteria been defined to determine which areas may be rationalized without compromising the fundamental mandates of the General Assembly. And if I can refer again to the guidance issued just recently by the Controller— that's the instructions, forgive me, and they came out on Tuesday— and entities are asked to submit proposals to achieve the targets through meaningful efficiencies in the way in which they work. In crafting their proposals, the entities are to be guided by the objective to minimise the negative impact on mandate implementation. However, if proposals— if the proposal is expected to impact the implementation of the mandated programme of work, then the entities will include that information in their proposal, including the potential for mitigating mitigation measures, and those will be reviewed by senior leadership as all of these proposals come in. Any reduction proposals that come through should allow the organisation to continue to fully meet the obligations in terms of servicing meetings and providing the required support to intergovernmental bodies. Thank you very much for your patience. as I went through those, those several questions. Thank you very much, distinguished co-chairs.

Thank you, Ms. Costa, for that comprehensive response. And I now give the floor to Mr. Ian Phillips.

Thank you, co-chair. I'll start by addressing the question of accessibility and inclusivity from the European Union. Our web services team in DGC continues to partner with the UN Disability Strategy Team and the EOSG to publish the SG's reports in all available formats. That means PDFs, e-publication, and easy-to-read formats. We are partnering with OICT to develop platforms that will allow content providers to create accessible web pages and to ensure new sites are properly reviewed and made accessible before launch. We continue to work with content providers across the Secretariat, including UNDSS, DGACM and DPPA to help them better understand what digital accessibility means and how to implement it. And we're also preparing a training session to help content providers understand what is expected of them on a UN site. This will be launched in mid-2025, so in coming weeks, and we will work together with OICT to ensure all website editors have taken this training. On the issue of multilingualism, This is, of course, core to what we do in DGC, something we take very seriously. Echoing USG, the liquidity crisis does have an impact on multilingualism. We have not been able to hire the press officers that we were asked to hire and we were given the posts for this year. But we are looking for solutions compared to this time last year. AI has advanced rapidly and we are embracing that technology to try and deliver in more languages. You will see the results of that this year. We're currently experimenting with pilot programs. We're not publishing them yet. It needs human oversight. It's very complex. We want to be absolutely sure that what we're providing is accurate. But the results so far have been very encouraging. We're looking at various software tools on the market to, to enhance translation. We find that some tools are better than others depending on the language. Depending on the part of the world, but the results are encouraging and you will see results of that this year. On the issue of press coverage, meetings coverage, to the distinguished delegate from Algeria, this is a very important service and we're very gratified that member states always put a lot of importance on this. We, we produce thousands of press releases annually on hundreds of intergovernmental meetings. It has to rank as one of the most complicated and challenging jobs in this building. We do have vigorous editorial standards. We want to be accurate. We want to be quick. But more than anything, we want to be accurate. We have levels of scrutiny in place that might seem unusual in the private sector. We have editors, we have proofreaders, we have press offices because we take this very seriously. Mistakes are extremely rare, but we do welcome input. We get it from delegations. If you see something that you don't agree with, continue to let us know and we will address them as fast as we possibly can. On the subject of UN80, I just want to say that despite the constraints we have, we are looking at this as an opportunity. We have to. And one of the topics I mentioned in my address was something I hope we can ask your help for.

We are—

we piloted a project during High Level Week last year to have live broadcast one-on-one interviews between broadcasters from your, from your countries with delegates from your countries. So we would pull out with your help, a prime minister, a president, a foreign minister, to talk about the importance of what was happening inside the GA to broadcasters live. We had a position on the lawn outside and one inside just in case the weather was bad. It was a pilot last year, but it's going to be much bigger this year. So help us help you.

If we—

if you hear requests from us about a broadcaster in your country would love to speak to one of your delegation, please help us get access. It proved a success last year. It was very popular, and we particularly targeted countries that wouldn't normally have the resources to send correspondents or reporters to the UN. So this gives an extra insight to your countries about what's happening here. So I hope that's appreciated by you.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Phillips, and for that innovation also. and we encourage you to continue doing that. So, we've heard from all members of the Secretariat, so we'll go for the second round, and I give the floor to the representative of the United States.

Great.

Thank you so much, Co-Chair, and thanks to all the representatives of the Secretariat here today and for their very thorough responses to all the questions asked by delegations. I'll just be very brief. Several of the representatives here today referred to equitable geographic representation, and I would be remiss if I did not remind members of the Secretariat that that term actually has not an approved definition in the context of HRM, and we would encourage you to refrain from using so until the membership has applied a definition. Thank you.

Thank you, United States. I do not see any other requests for the floor, so I wish to, on behalf of all of us really, wish to thank representatives of the Secretariat for being with us this morning and briefing us, and importantly for addressing the questions that you put forward to them. But I also want to thank all members of the delegation, the various delegations that did pose questions to the Secretariat. And as practiced before in past sessions, there will be a summary of this comprehensive interactive dialogue, and it will be distributed among members of the ad hoc working group in due course. So thank you, representative of the Secretariat. And colleagues, we will pause the meeting briefly to allow the representatives of the Secretariat to leave the podium, and then we shall proceed with our meeting.

Thank you.