(Part 1) Briefing for Delegates on the 81st General Assembly and Main Committees Meetings & Events Date: 14 September 2026 Language: English Transcript: https://transcripts.un.org/fr/asset/k1i/k1idf78jrd?lang=en Transcripts available through this tool are created by using automatic speech recognition and are not official records nor official documents of the United Nations. Official records and official documents are available on the Official Document System of the United Nations. --- UNITAR · Moderator · Rabi al-Haddad [0:00]: Start right now. So, Excellencies, ladies and gentlemen, so I would like to welcome you all to today's unitary briefing for delegates on the 81st session of the General Assembly and its main committees. I would like to recognize the person sitting here to my right side, Dr. Djibril Diallo. He was right now just telling me about his long experience with UNITAR back in the '90s when UNITAR used to be headquartered here in New York. Thank you for being with us. You are the Chef de Cabinet of the President-elect, and you are representing His Excellency today. Please extend our congratulations to the new PGA, Mr. Khairul Rahman, and wish him good luck for his presidency of the 81st session. He has a long responsibility, and I think it's going to be a challenging and a key year for us all here in New York. I would like to also thank His Excellency Mr. Burhan Ghafour, the Ambassador of Singapore, for not only being here with us, for supporting this initiative. At one moment in time, I was sitting with him, And he also told me that this initiative started as an initiative from Singapore, without UNITAR. And this is the best example of when a member state works hand in hand with the United Nations organization for achieving the purposes of the international organization, which is consensus, positive outcomes to multilateral negotiations, and also upholding the values of the United Nations. So Before coming here, I went through artificial intelligence. And I wanted to unpack the two words, general assembly. What do we mean by general? What do we mean by assembly? And I realized something. So what did the artificial intelligence give me? It gave me the following synonyms for general. Overall, broad, widespread, universal. And assembly, gathering, meeting, assemblage, convention, and conference. So basically, the message is very clear. This is the widest gathering with an aim, with a purpose, aligned with the principles of the United Nations and the values of the United Nations in a principal organ that has the widest mandate of any of the bigger international organization in the world. Don't underestimate it. This is extremely important. This means that we are dealing with the heart of the intergovernmental machinery of the United Nations. And it is not a surprise that the drafters of the Charter of the United Nations mentioned in Article 7 as a principal organ, the first one is the GA. And the message was clear, to give legal personality to the international organization, you must go first through the General Assembly. And this is why this training today is extremely important for us. So we are going to go through the knowledge of the General Assembly, its structure, working methods and rules of procedure that will help us, of course, extract order and meaning for everything that we want to achieve this year together. However, I want to come back to the campaign that the President, Khalil al-Rahman, led this year. One of the topics of his campaign was consensus building, if I remember. and also trust building. And I think whatever we are trying to achieve here, thanks to the support of Singapore and the Forum on Small States, is reinventing trust building together. And this is the value, the core value of this training that we are going to have beyond, of course, all the workshops that we have during today. So with that, it is my great pleasure to welcome you once again and to give the floor to first His Excellency Ambassador Burhan Ghafur. Thank you. Singapore · Permanent Representative · Burhan Ghafoor [4:15]: Thank you very much, Rabi, for the introduction. And I'm very honored to be joined at this podium by my good friend, Dr. Djibril Diallo, Chef de Cabinet of the President of the 81st Session of the General Assembly. Both Dr. Diallo and myself, we had the honor of being here in the 1990s. And when I was a young delegate in those days, in 1990, that was my very first session of the General Assembly. As a delegate, I attended a UNITAR training seminar. So that was my introduction and initiation into the world of UN diplomacy. And it is from that idea that we in Singapore have always believed in helping young delegates navigate the world of multilateral diplomacy. So we began this partnership with UNITAR more than 10 years ago to organize an annual event here that will give an overview of the General Assembly session to newly arrived delegates from capital. I'm very happy to see so many of you here present today attending this session. Obviously, you have a program laid out in front of you, and my role really is to give you some very brief opening remarks. And what I intend to do is to provide you the larger context in which the work of the UN will take place. And if you follow the news very carefully, it is no secret that we are in a period of great geopolitical tension, with many conflicts and rivalries and challenges before us as an international community. And in such a context, the UN itself is being tested. Multilateralism as an experiment began 80 years ago in San Francisco, is being tested. And I would describe the UN as being in a period of transition and transformation. Transformation because the geopolitical context has introduced a lot of dynamics which requires the UN to adapt to this new environment. Transition in some ways because it is a fact that we are in the midst of selecting a new Secretary General and the process will take some time before a decision is reached. and beginning of next year you will have a new Secretary-General in place and that will come with a new vision and a new set of priorities. It is also a period of determined leadership, I think, on the part of the President of the General Assembly. We recently elected Dr. Khalilur Rahman of Bangladesh as the President of the 81st session and he has come in with a clear set of priorities and you will hear from his Chef de Cabinet on some of the priorities of the President of the General Assembly. So that is the context in which our work is going to take place as the United Nations. In the '90s, I should say quite frankly, the UN was in its heydays, if you like. There was a degree of great power convergence and collaboration, but some of that has been challenged by a lack of trust, a lack of communication, and, of course, differences in terms of how geopolitical issues are approached. And that is causing quite a bit of undercurrent, I would say. So whichever committee you are going to be, you are going to be seeing expressions of some of these differences. But I would also say at this point that we are at a point of great opportunity and pragmatic optimism, in my view. Opportunity in the sense that precisely because we are in a period of transition and transformation, I think there is a lot that can be done and must be done. But at the same time, it is an occasion for pragmatic optimism, not naive optimism, but pragmatic optimism in the sense that there are things that can be done and must be done and we must be pragmatic about doing it and seizing the opportunities. If we are fixated with a certain way of doing things, if we are ideological about how we want to achieve certain resolutions or solutions, we will not be able to find those solutions. That is, in my view, the essence of multilateral diplomacy, about finding solutions collectively. Let me quickly make three brief points. First, The UN has never been a perfect organization, but it is the only organization that is universal. It is the only one that we have. If we do not have it, we would have to invent it, but because we have it, we have to make it work. And I know that the UN sometimes does get a bad press, but the bad press is not the result of any structural deficiency in the way the UN is organized. It is because member states are not always up to the task of reaching consensus or finding solutions. But ultimately, the UN was designed as a platform for member states to come together to find the solutions that they need to find. And this is where your role as diplomats come in, and that's my second point. Each one of you are delegates representing your country. and in a multilateral context, I believe that individuals can make a difference. And I believe that diplomats can make a difference. In an age of AI, where everything can be put into a program to look for answers and solutions, what exactly is the role of a diplomat? What exactly is the role of a delegate that you are today? In my view, it is about that human touch. The solutions you want or need at a theoretical or conceptual level can be found in your ChatGPT or Claude programs. You type it in, it spews out an answer. But that human touch is irreplaceable. And that is your role as individuals and as diplomats to make that human touch, to walk that last mile, to reach out your hand and offer it to someone else, especially on the other side of the aisle. And by that I mean reaching out to people who have a different view. So resist the temptation to be enclosed in your own bubble of like-minded friends and delegations. My advice to you, humble advice, is that you reach out and talk to people who express a different point of view. It is only by listening and understanding people who express a different point of view that you are able to begin to sketch the contours of a convergence potentially. And that, I think, is really important. Very often, especially as diplomats and newly arrived delegates, you might be intimidated by the number of people that you see, but everyone behind a nameplate is also a diplomat like you. a delegate like you. Introduce yourself, say hello to them, and express an interest in understanding their point of view. I really feel that in the multilateral context, we talk a lot, we speak a lot, but we don't always listen a lot. So this is also an opportunity, in my view, to practice your listening skills. So do not underestimate the power that you have as a delegate of your country to make a difference. And of course, you have instructions from your capital. Your permanent representative or your supervisor in your mission here will give you specific instructions. Do not agree to this. Do not concede that point. This comma is crucial for our national security, and we are going to die over a ditch if we do not have a comma. Yes, there are many battles that have been fought over commas and asterisks and punctuations, but look at the big picture. Look at what is at stake for your country, of course. I'm not asking you to betray your instructions, but I'm asking you to look at the bigger picture. What is in the best interest of your country? Can you achieve that alone or collectively? If your conclusion is that your best interests are served by a collective solution, then it goes without saying that you need to work with as many people as possible to craft a collective compromise or a solution to whatever the challenge or problem that is before you. And that is, in fact, my last point. Ultimately, at the UN, there are no zero-sum solutions. We are always looking for mutually beneficial outcomes, outcomes that serve everyone roughly, not equally, but roughly in a way that brings everyone together. So that too is my humble advice to you. Look for solutions, look for convergence, look for compromises without compromising your principles, all that is possible. In fact, the 80 years of the history of the UN has shown that When we strive for collective outcomes, when we strive for bridging solutions, the net outcome is always superior because everyone comes along and you have a certain value in that in terms of stability and collective prosperity. The final thing I would say, if this is your very first time that you are at the UN attending as a representative of your country, enjoy every moment of it. This is going to be an incredible learning journey for you, and it can be very transformative, both professionally, personally. Learn as much as you can, talk to other people. and enjoy it and go out and have a good time in the city as well. But do not lose the big picture. I think at the end of the day, we here at the UN are engaged in a very meaningful enterprise, which is to bring people together, bring countries together for a better outcome for all our nations in the world. And I wish you a very productive 81st session as delegates to this meeting. Thank you very much, Rabi, once again for doing this. And Dr. Diallo, sorry to have kept you waiting. UNITAR · Moderator · Rabi al-Haddad [15:30]: Thank you very much, Ambassador, for all of this advice. I think I can summarize it by saying, you know, your mouth spoke of what your heart is full of. And I think, you know, this is coming from a place of generosity and also a lot of positive energy. Thank you. Dr. Diallo, the floor is yours. Thank you very much for being with us. GA · Chef de Cabinet · Djibril Diallo [15:55]: Thank you very much. And I'm very happy to be here with Ambassador Burhan Kharroub, with Rafiv Al-Haddad. And before I begin, let me say how pleased I am to be here with Ambassador Ghafoor, Permanent Representative of Singapore to the United Nations, a dear brother. But Ambassador Ghafoor is a great friend of the United Nations, a great friend of the General Assembly of the United Nations. Because one of the things that we need to learn and we share with each other is how do we take advantage of the time we're spending here in order to move very quickly. And I, for one, have found in Ambassador Ghafoor the idea of a personality who's always very generous in sharing ideas, in sharing ways in which we can make the most of our presence here at the United Nations. He has consistently brought wisdom, He has consistently brought warmth and also a strong spirit, as we just heard, of multilateralism to the work of the United Nations. And I was honored to accompany the President of the 81st session of the United Nations General Assembly to a very successful gathering that Ambassador Ghafoor organized, which was the Forum of Small States, with the participation of the president himself. So this is Ambassador Ghafoor, this is again another possibility, another illustration of the remarkable ability that you have as ambassador to bring people together And I want to thank you again for that. And some of us grew up in the United Nations. I was recruited at age 27 by the late Kofi Annan. We were PhD in linguistics and communication from the University of London. So that this is our world. And what we can do is to see individuals like Ambassador Ghafoor, see individuals like Rabi El Haddad and point them so that we can make sure that they have the space in order to help those of us who are learning every day about the United Nations system. So I'm going to deliver now the message of the President of the General Assembly. Before then, I wanted again to come back to what Dr. Rabi al-Haddad has said, which is My relationship with UNITAR goes to the 1990s. UNITAR is a very, very important institution in terms of learning, in terms of training and research, and always have had very great respect for it in my capacity, for instance, as Director of Communications of the United Nations Development Programme. So the message is as follows. One, that the President of the 81st session of the General Assembly would like to thank UNITAR for this briefing on the 81st session of the General Assembly, not only the General Assembly itself, but also its main committees, which is a very, very important dimension. And I'm also pleased to welcome you as delegates who will be participating in this General Assembly. I think that many of you who were there on Tuesday 8th of September heard and saw the statement, opening statement by the President of the General Assembly and we have received a lot of positive responses on that statement so far. So the next few weeks will be a whirlwind and at times, for those of you who may not be familiar with it, they may sound a bit chaotic. But I promise you, it's not always like that. As Ambassador Gaffaud mentioned, you are arriving at a particularly consequential time for the United Nations General Assembly. He has mentioned the UN reform process, which continues through the UN80 initiative, the selection process for the next Secretary-General of the United Nations being underway, and also there is a lengthy agenda of pressing issues that will be critical to our collective work across the main committees. In short, you and ourselves will therefore say we have our hands full for the next several months. That makes today's briefing all the more important, because through this briefing and other interactions that you will have, you will have an understanding of how this place, the United Nations, works. How the main bodies and the organs of the UN, the committees, the plenaries, all of them, how they work. It's a complex organism built partly on protocol and partly on eight decades of practice. Even seasoned diplomats who have been here for years will tell you that we still occasionally discover something we did not know before. But then again, what else would you expect from an organization? This is the only organization where you have 193 countries getting together in one place, no other place in the world where it happens. So what else would you expect for 193 countries to get together for eight decades. So I hope that you will find all of this as interesting, as fascinating, or at least as closely linked to the priorities that your own individual countries have set for yourselves. Colleagues, as many of you well know, The President of the General Assembly is responsible for stewarding this process through the coming year, and President Rahman has outlined six priorities for the period ahead. And I'm going to go through them again as a reminder of his statement at the General Assembly. Peace and security, number one. Number two, sustainable development. Number three, climate action. Number four, human rights. Number five, technological transformation. And number six, restoring trust in multilateralism. Each of these priorities reflects the range of pressures facing the organization and are themselves issues that member states have called for us to act upon. They are also priorities that you yourselves will address head on in the main committees. Each committee, of course, has its own area of work. but together they reflect the full scope of the Assembly's responsibilities, touching upon each one of the priorities that the President has outlined. A close working relationship between the Committees and the Office of the President of the General Assembly is therefore essential. You will be hearing quite often from our colleagues including from the President himself, who, as is tradition, will address the opening of each committee once High-Level Week is over. Colleagues, there are two messages that I would like to leave with you today. Number one, please do not underestimate the role that each and every one of you will play in shaping the future of this institution, that is the future of the United Nations. The President has repeatedly said that our goal must be to make the United Nations fit for the future. That means continuing the reform process, but more importantly, digging deeper into what reform actually means. Why are we in the financial situation that we are in today? What needs to be done to change it? And what kind of United Nations do we need for the decades to come? Even if you are not working directly on UN80 reform process, that does not mean that you are removed from the discussion. individually and collectively. Quite the contrary, the work of the committees helps set the work stream, mandates, and ultimately the resources required for the United Nations. The decision you take here are therefore deeply consequential to the future of the United Nations. Second point, embrace the spirit of diplomacy upon which this house is built. Looking at the faces around this room, I saw so many young faces, which is really hope for the United Nations, because the youth are the leaders of today, not the leaders of tomorrow. So when I look around, there are so many younger faces that I feel very happy with the future of the United Nations. You will disagree, as Ambassador Ghafar has said. You may see people who disagree with you, but come to them and discuss with them. You will also disagree profoundly, but inaction serves no one, and stalemate gets us nowhere. As you know, in your training and your experience, Diplomacy requires us, first and foremost, to have listening capacity, to engage, and number three, sometimes to compromise. That is not a weakness of this institution called the United Nations. It is how 193 countries as member states find a way forward together. So as we embrace this working session, I would like again to thank you for really being here and looking forward to connecting with you. Thank you very much again. UNITAR · Moderator · Rabi al-Haddad [29:16]: Thank you very much, Dr. Diallo, for blessing us with your presence, first of all, and with the generosity of your advice and your kind words. Please convey our sincere thanks to the President of the General Assembly and tell him he has all our support and I think every human being here is going to work in this direction. So, thank you very much and thank you, Ambassador Ghafour. Yes, of course. Before I give you the floor, I just want to say also thank you for the Forum of Small States that is also supporting this. So, the floor is yours. Thank you. Singapore · Permanent Representative · Burhan Ghafoor [29:47]: Thank you very much, Rabi, for those remarks and thank you for acknowledging the role of the Forum of Small States as well in organizing this together in partnership with UNITAR. And my thanks also to the message, very strong, resounding message from the President of the General Assembly. I just wanted to say that as part of our work process here, the Secretariat staff will be your important partners and allies in navigating the process during the General Assembly. And I just wanted to say, if you're contemplating the rest of the program for the day, you are going to be hearing from Kenji Nakano, and I'm sure Ravi Haddad will introduce you, but I want to say that Kenji is one of the most knowledgeable person in the UN system about the rules of procedure. about the functioning and proceedings of UN meetings. So it is a real treat to have him here. And Kenji is just seated by the corner. You will hear from him shortly together with his colleague, Rommel Maranan. And then after that, Beatrix is the chief of protocol. She will be coming to brief you as well. That too is a real masterclass in how protocol works at the UN and how protocol sometimes is very political. And at the UN, there's a saying that there's nothing that is procedural or protocol because everything is fundamentally political, but there are protocol rules, there are rules of procedure, and I think Beatrix, uh, will give you an overview. And then the session on the overview of the main committees is not an overview of all the committees, but I think you have two important secretaries of committees coming here. It is also a treat to listen to them because ultimately each committee is different, but there are also a lot of similarities in how the committees function. And then in the afternoon, do not miss the session on rules of procedure because like in any intergovernmental process or any structured institution, there are clear rules. So in terms of how you make your statements, rights of reply, putting forward motions, amendments, proposals, how resolutions are adopted, et cetera, this is really fundamental to understanding how the parliamentary process here works. And the last session today, do not skip that. It is one of the most important issues that is right now you know, in the minds of many diplomats, the relationship between the Security Council and the General Assembly. And Blanca, who is going to be giving you that remark, she's in fact right now writing a book on multilateralism. She's a very accomplished secretariat staff. I just wanted to, Ravi, perhaps I jumped the gun a little bit by introducing, but I wanted to make a pitch for the fact that the secretariat is a very important player in our multilateral process. They are international civil servants. They are neutral. They do not take positions, but they are a treasure trove of information. Approach them. They are very friendly and very nice, and they can be very helpful to you in terms of advising you whatever your questions that might be. Finally, embrace the chaos. The UN, no matter how much rules there are, you know, it is a vibrant place. So it is not what it seems. It's not as chaotic as it as you think it is. It is part of that very dynamic multilateral process where 193 countries come together. So enjoy the process. You are going to really have a lot of fun and also a lot of learning in the days and weeks ahead. Thank you very much, Rabi, once again. You know, with diplomats, you should not give them a microphone more than once, but you made that mistake, so I made another statement. Thank you very much. UNITAR · Moderator · Rabi al-Haddad [33:49]: Thank you very much. This is your forum. This is your conference. Thank you. So we will liberate you right now, and then we go straight into substance. Thank you. Okay, so let's move forward and let's please allow me to give you an overview of the program of today very quickly. So today's briefing, as Ambassador Ghafur mentioned, is structured in two parts. Session one will focus on the General Assembly and the main committees, focusing on the program of work of the 81st session, elections, draft resolutions, rules of procedure, and the work of the main committees. Session two will focus on working within the General Assembly, looking at some of the practical dimensions of engaging with the GA, including the role and the protocol of the protocol and liaison service and the relationship between the General Assembly, like Ambassador Kapur mentioned, and the Security Council. So we will conclude session one at 1:00. 00 to 3:00, and we will reconvene at 3:00 in the afternoon for session two to start with the program. concluding at 5 o'clock maximum, I promise. Today's briefing will also be live streamed via the United Nations webcast, allowing colleagues who are unable to join us in person to follow these discussions here today. Beyond the structure and the schedule, I would encourage you to think of today as an opportunity to learn from one another as well. We are very pleased to be joined by colleagues and experts from all over the Secretariat. And by the way, one thing that Ambassador Ghafoor forgot to mention that international civil servants at the service of member states. This is our role and he is 100% right. So seize this opportunity to, you know, gather as much information for the persons who are there to service the common good, which is the positive outcome to any negotiation and a conference. So now we are going to start with session one and we are going to start with you. Kenji, thank you very much for being with us. You are chief of the General Assembly Affairs Branch and we have with us also Rommel Maranan, who is Associate Intergovernmental Affairs Officer. I strongly recommend at one moment in time, but not all of you at the same time, to pay a visit to Kenji in his office, because like Ambassador Ghafur mentioned, he represents the institutional memory of the United Nations. There is a story to be told, and that story is on, part of it is on the walls of your office. So I give you the floor. Thank you for being with us. UN Secretariat · Chief, General Assembly Affairs Branch · Kenji Nakano [36:45]: Thank you. Good morning, colleagues. Romeo and I are pleased to join you in this briefing program. And this is nuts and bolts. As the Ambassador of Singapore said, you will have the whole day of program from different aspects. And so I will first talk about the program work of the General Assembly for the current 81st session. very briefly, and then Romeo will talk about the elections and submission of draft resolutions. There will be, as you know, a separate segment this afternoon on the rules of procedure by a colleague from the Office of Legal Affairs. So let us try to focus on this morning on the aspects not related to rules of procedure. Of course, everything is related, but I will try to focus on the program of work and elections and the draft resolutions. So the program of work, which is sort of calendar, how the whole day calendar will go. Just before starting that, may I ask you to raise hand if you were not here last September for the High-Level Week? You are so new that you... Okay, so you are about to see the High-Level Week for the first time, most of you. Great, great. So I hope that's going to be an exciting thing. This slide will be circulated by UNITAR, so you don't have to take note of every single line. In the Daily Journal of the United Nations, the important documents for the 81st section are already listed like this. This is a copy from the Daily Journal every day under the general information section, there is this list. and I just put in the red boxes some important documents. So on the far right, there is agenda A/81/251. So this is agenda for the new session. Agenda is a document of 170 plus items approved by the General Assembly for the new session this past Friday. So until then, the Assembly had provisional agenda. But, you know, 251, the agenda is so new, so it will start to be listed instead of the provisional agenda, perhaps tomorrow. The second box, annotated agenda number 100 and 100 addendum 1. These are very useful. These are thick documents. and will have detailed history, what resolutions were adopted under a given agenda item in the past, and what is expected for the new session. So it's a low profile document, but enormously helpful to you. So 100 and 100 addendum one. And then There's a document, the draft program of work. This is a calendar, basically, which is 900. That is the next box. And it was issued in July, which was under the 80th session. So hence, A/80 instead of 81, 900. And I will show you from the next page, or a few pages later, what are in 900, the draft calendar. And finally, at the bottom, INF, A/INF, that's for information, 81/4, this is about the high-level week, the passes, the protocol, security information, what kind of high-level meetings there are besides the general debate. That's all in this document. So it's also very useful for the next two weeks. The announcement in the journal continues like this. I will not go over everything, but the seating protocol is mentioned, starting with Morocco in the first row as a result of the drawing of lots three months ago by the Secretary-General, and then following English alphabetical order. And the general debate, the list of speakers, speakers and then the fact that the time limit should be 15 minutes, although there is no microphone cutoff for your heads of state and government, and the theme that the President of the General Assembly has chosen for the General Debate. And then the high-level week, that's next week. So General Debate, as mentioned, is on 22 to 28 September. So that's from Tuesday next week until the Monday the week afterwards. And we will meet on Saturday as well, but not on Sunday, the 27th. 00 AM until the list of speakers is exhausted, 00 PM or 10:00 PM. So it's a long, long day each day. And besides the general debate, which will be held without exception in the General Assembly Hall, the General Assembly, you, or your predecessors, mandated five thematic high-level meetings for this period. One on the right to development on Wednesday. Secondly, sea level rise on Thursday. and on Friday, pandemics, and Monday on the second week, Durban Declaration and Programme of Action, and fifthly, on Tuesday, 29 September, nuclear weapons. So all these were mandated by the General Assembly. In spite of its own provision at the bottom, saying that, well, you know, we are so busy during the general debate, let's not have too many high level meetings and maximum three. General Assembly said that the same General Assembly mandated five. Well, is this exception not not really for for information for 2027, in spite of that same resolution, maximum three. the assembly, your predecessors have mandated five for information. So what will happen after the high level week and your leaders will come and go and very busy week, you will be exhausted. And after that, you will have main committees from first committee to six committees. Those will be discussed at the later segment by our colleagues. So we'll focus on the General Assembly plenary and what will happen. So there will be meetings, as I mentioned in the calendar, the draft calendar, 8/80/900. And most of the plenary meetings will be scheduled from October through December, although many other meetings will be held after January. So this is the beginning of October. So the high level meeting, high level week is over and no 5th of October that's the beginning of the fifth week of the current session the session began last week on Tuesday the 81st session and I will not go over everything but highlighted uh in yellow here uh October 13th Tuesday election of of the Human Rights Council. So there will be an election with casting ballot papers, which Romeo will talk about. Then the next page has this blue line, report of the International Court of Justice, Thursday 29 October. So why I highlighted this because General Assembly is one of the six principal organs according to the charter. Charter lists six principal organs of the United Nations along with the Security Council, Economic and Social Council, International Court of Justice, the Trusteeship Council, International Court of Justice and the Secretariat. So each of those will send an annual report to the General Assembly, and the General Assembly would consider each of those. Trusteeship Council is currently not in action, so there is no report for Trusteeship Council, but the rest are sending. So here is one of them, annual report of the International Court of Justice. And then here is another election in yellow. This is an election for members of International Court of Justice. So judges will be elected on Tuesday, the 3rd of November, again, with casting of ballot papers. Here is another principal organ report, report of the Economic and Social Council, the 10th of November. So the president of the ECOSOC will come to the General Assembly and introduce the report. And we will continue like this. And the calendar lists up until the 9th of December. Besides these, the same draft calendar, 8/80/900, that lists other items that are not scheduled yet. But so the date is to be decided. And a very prominent one is the appointment of the Secretary General. So this will come sometime, is supposed to come sometime this autumn, October, November, December, at some point when the Security Council sends its recommendation to the General Assembly, but the date is not known yet. So this is a calendar from September, including the high-level week, until December. So what exactly are those meetings So at each meeting, the General Assembly considers the agenda item and there is a debate. Debate is basically statements, statements. President of the General Assembly, PGA, President of the General Assembly is PGA. That's a very often used acronym. Not Professional Golf Association, President of the General Assembly, PGA, and SG, Secretary General, they may or may not make a statement. And then statement by member states, and General Assembly has observers. There are 119 of them, and they can also make a statement in any debate on the item. And statements and if there is any draft resolution associated with the agenda item, then there is an introduction of that draft resolution. After the debate, if there is any draft resolution, the General Assembly will take action on that with or without a vote. When there is an adoption without a vote, that's That basically happens when the president, PGA, asks, is there any objection? May I take it that the Assembly wishes to adopt this draft resolution? I see no objection. It's so decided. So so-called consensus adoption, consensus, that is the adoption without a vote. And at the same time, main committees, first through six committees, meeting and then they will eventually send their recommendations to the plenary. So these recommendations will be considered in December. So there is one General Assembly plenary meeting, one day in December to consider all first committee recommendations, the same another plenary meeting to consider all second committee resolutions and so on and so forth. And normally the last main committee that comes to the plenary is the fifth committee, which could be around Christmas Eve or even after that. I have seen fifth committee recommendations coming to the GA plenary on the 31st of December. So let's hope that it will be better this year. And then after January, So the first part is called the main part of the 81st session. And the second part is resumed part. So main part from September through December and resume part from January to September. That's two parts of the 81st session. So what will happen in the resumed part? Resumed part will continue to have formal plenary meetings, as I mentioned, on different subjects. For example, the report of the Security Council, that comes normally around June to the General Assembly because of their reporting cycle. So there is a debate on that report. Also, the PGA, again, the President of the General Assembly, tends to hold many thematic debates or high level meetings on some topics as an informal meeting of a plenary. So now informal, so there is more flexibility as to who can speak. For example, scholars, experts, non-governmental organizations, journalists, they can be brought to these thematic debates by the discretion of the President of the General Assembly as an informal meeting of the plenary. And of course, no member states can make their own contribution too. Secretary General may make some briefings in a informal meeting of the plenary. Like in the last couple months, the Secretary General has been giving a briefing pretty much on a monthly basis on the UN 80, the reform initiative, to have exchange, to provide updates, and then to have the ambassadors an opportunity to give their inputs. And also there will be informal consultations or negotiations led by co-facilitators appointed by the President of the General Assembly. So the PGA would appoint normally two ambassadors to lead negotiation on the outcome document of the future high-level meeting, for example. So next week, these five high-level meetings, some of them will have an outcome document that are the products of such co-facilitator-led informal consultation that went on since this past January until recently. So with that, and there are a few other details, but in the interest of time, you will see, you will receive this slide, and I will hand over to Romeo for his part, and at the end, we can certainly entertain your questions. And of course, you know, you will come up with questions as the session proceeds. So we are available. If you send me an e-mail, then, you know, either I or my colleague, somebody will respond to you. So, you know, you're always welcome. We are here to serve you. And with that, Romeo. UN Secretariat · Associate Intergovernmental Affairs Officer · Rommel Maranan [55:25]: Thank you very much, Kenji. Thank you, Rabi. Good morning, distinguished delegates, colleagues. So before we start, while our colleague from UNITAR is setting up my PowerPoint presentation, I just wanted to note that we will have a lot to go through and given the limited time that we have, we will have to skim through some of the slides. But do not worry, as Kenji mentioned, we will be sharing with you the briefing material. UNITAR will be sending them to you at the end of this workshop. So Okay. All right. So if I could just have the slides, please, on the screen. Okay. Thank you. So if you just allow me, I would like to start with the resolutions as we have more to cover on that in terms of the scope. And then we will proceed on elections at the after my presentation on our resolutions. So General Assembly resolutions, what are they exactly? So resolutions are formal expressions of the opinion or the will of a UN organ. As the General Assembly is the chief deliberative policy making and representative organ of the United Nations, its resolutions provide policy recommendations, they assign mandates to the UN Secretariat and the subsidiary bodies of the General Assembly, and also they decide on questions regarding the UN budget. With the exception of decisions on payment to regular and peacekeeping budgets of the UN, GA resolutions, as you may know, are not binding for member states. The implementation of the recommendations contained in GA resolutions is the responsibility of each member state. So now let's look at the process of how resolutions are submitted and adopted in the GA. So draft resolutions or decisions are referred to as proposals, also according to the GA Rules of Procedure. So there are three different types of proposals. So they may be first submitted by a state or a group of states. They could also be submitted by the President of the General Assembly, or they could come from a GA subsidiary organ, such as one of the six main committees. So for those submitted by states or group of states, informal consultations on the text are led by the delegation or the delegations who are the main sponsors of that draft resolution or decision. The General Assembly Secretariat is not involved in the process of the negotiation, so that is a delegation led process. And we will only be involved before the submission of once the delegations have finished their informal consultations and they have the text for submission. for issuance as an L document. So that means that room bookings, communication to delegations are done by those delegations leading, by those main sponsors leading the consultations. Of course, substantive offices may be involved prior to the submission of the proposal. Delegations may also announce these informal consultations and negotiations in the Journal of the UN. And later I'll discuss more on this. Proposals can be opened for co-sponsorship by other states through e-delegate. So proposals submitted by the General Assembly, the President of the General Assembly, for those proposals, usually there are informal consultations led by co-facilitators that are appointed by the President. Same as the other proposals, the GA Secretariat may be involved in informal consultations for these co-facilitator led negotiations. So for those cases, we will be doing the room bookings and handling the preparations for the informal consultations. And usually, again, operative word is usually, these are consensus-based texts. And like proposals by states or group of states, proposals submitted by the President of the General Assembly, These are closed for co-sponsorship by states. So for proposals submitted by a subsidiary organs, such as main committees, negotiations take place in those respective organs or committees. And proposals are closed for co-sponsorship once they reach to the plenary. And basically these main committees will submit these proposals for recommendation for adoption by the plenary. And whatever action is done in the main committees, the plenary repeats the pattern of their consideration in the committee. So any recorded votes that were taken in the committee are also done in plenary. So now I would like to walk you through the cycle of a proposal from the time of submission to the time of its adoption in plenary. So proposals submitted by a state or a group of states are submitted first via e-delegate. And we'll be going more into that later. But before we go into this cycle, again, I want to remind that the negotiations and informal consultations on these proposals would already have been done prior to the submission of the text. So there is an understanding that the text that is being submitted for issuance in the document has already been negotiated and that it has either reached consensus or at least get as close as possible to consensus. So the first step would be the submission of the proposal by via e-delegate. Proposals must be submitted at least five business days before its consideration in plenary, taking into account rule 78 of the rules of procedure. As highlighted here, no proposal shall be discussed or put to a vote at any meeting of the GA unless this proposal has been circulated to delegations not later than the day preceding the meeting. That's why we have the five business days, because we would need at least four business days to process the text for editing, for translation, and for issuance, and it has to be issued at least one day before its consideration in plenary. I will not go into the details of how to submit through e-delegate, but we have a very useful reference here. We have a submissions guideline which could be found online, which provides step-by-step instructions on how to prepare a proposal, how to initiate it on e-delegate, how to open it for co-sponsorship, and how to submit it for issuance as an official document. So submission of proposals from states and by the PGA are issued as L documents. You will hear this a lot, L doc. So they are issued a symbol A/ the session number, in this case 81, /L.number. So that is how your draft resolution and draft decision will be labeled with the GA symbol once it is for consideration in the General Assembly. And these L documents, once issued, are made available publicly on the UN official document system, or as we call them, ODS. Sorry to be flooding you with a lot of acronyms, but you will be hearing this a lot throughout your work here with the United Nations. Just also as a note, proposals recommended by main committees for adoption in general plenary are not issued as separate documents once it's submitted to the plenary. Rather, they will be contained in the reports of the main committees when submitted to plenary for recommendation for adoption. on co-sponsorship of a proposal. So proposals may be open for co-sponsorship, but this is not required. And as I said, proposals by the, submitted by the President of the General Assembly are not open for co-sponsorship. So there are two ways to express sponsorship for delegations who wish to co-sponsor a proposal. So they could do that either through e-delegate at once. that proposal has been initiated on e-delegate and it has been marked as open for co-sponsorship, delegations will receive a notification on e-delegate that this is ready for co-sponsorship. You may go into the system and co-sponsor a particular proposal. If you are unable to do that, you may also do it up until the time of consideration in plenary. So right before the action on that draft resolution or draft decision. member states in the GA hall will have the opportunity to co-sponsor this proposal. They will be asked to press the microphone button to signify their wish to be a co-sponsor. So guidelines on co-sponsorships can also be found on the same online guidelines that we have on submission of draft resolutions and decisions. Okay, so more on the nitty gritty part, but I will just skim through them. So once a proposal has been submitted to us, to DGACM, the editing of the proposal is done by our department, the Department for General Assembly and Conference Management, DGACM. So after submission, an assigned UN editor would review the proposal and make editorial suggestions as needed. And then us, the GA Secretariat, will then share these editorial queries and suggestions to the main sponsor who submitted the proposal. And then this is usually done by e-mail, and we would request you, if you're a main sponsor, that please pay attention to these editorial queries, because of course, the document will only be issued once you give your approval on these editorial comments and suggestions. And given the usual tight deadline that we have, usually we have the five business days turnaround between the submission until the adoption, we would really count on the quick response from main sponsors to respond to these editorial queries. So after that, we would also, number four, look into the scheduling of a meeting to consider your proposal. So after a proposal has been submitted to the secretariat, the secretariat will then in coordination with the Office of the President of the General Assembly, look into a date of consideration in plenary. The consideration of a proposal is usually done if there is a debate on the agenda item of that meeting. It can be done, the consideration can also be scheduled on the same date that a debate would be held on the agenda item where that proposal is submitted. However, we would like to note that in order to utilize plenary meetings effectively, the consideration of agenda items and proposals submitted under them are usually scheduled together in one meeting. So that means that the GA would usually not be in a position to schedule a dedicated plenary meeting just to consider one proposal. So once the schedule is confirmed with PGA, we, the secretariat, will get back to the main sponsor, the submitting delegation for the proposal. and to see if you agree on the date. And once there is an agreement, this will be reflected on the schedule of meetings of the GA website and in the UN journal. Okay, so this is one of the favorite topics of colleagues, program budget implications or PBIs. So proposals are submitted for review for any program budget implications. So that is done by the program planning and budget division of the MSPC. So it is handled by that division. But it is the process is initiated by us, the GA Secretariat, through whatever is submitted to us through eDelegate. So just to zoom in on this briefly, Rule 153 of the Rules of Procedure specifies that no resolution involving expenditure shall be recommended by a committee for approval by the General Assembly unless it is accompanied by an estimate of expenditures prepared by the GA. So draft resolutions that have program budget implications must first be considered by the Fifth Committee before they are taken up to the plenary for adoption. So more on more practical tips on advice on program budget implications. the secretariat would not be in a position to offer advice on PBIs until the proposal is formally submitted for issuance in L document. So that starts the process of reviewing a proposal for any program budget implications. And a minimum of 48 hours is required for the PBI review. Also very important on the use of the language within existing resources. I'm sure you've seen this a lot in draft resolutions and draft decisions. so that the use of this language on proposals does not rule out any program budget implications as there are limits to what can be absorbed in the existing budget of the UN. So especially in the context of the ongoing liquidity crisis, we would ask delegations to refrain from using within existing resources and expecting that this, you know, that there will be no PBIs on a draft resolution or draft decision. So what exactly would trigger one of the possible triggers of program budget implications. So here are just some example of languages that may trigger PBIs. If the draft resolution says, requests the SG to submit a new report, to establish a dedicated new capacity, so to decide to convene an open-ended working group or a conference or a meeting. So these are usually languages that would trigger program budget implications. But on the other hand, you know, if there is a request to continue the issuance of a report that has already been mandated or invites or encourages. So these languages usually do not trigger PBIs. Okay. So once the review for program budget implications is completed, An oral statement might be issued by the Secretariat which details any administrative or financial implications of the adoption of a draft resolution. So right here on this, shown on the screen, would be an example of an oral statement that the Secretariat would issue. This will be read out by the Secretary before the consideration of the proposal in plenary and will also be circulated to delegations to e-delegate in advance of the consideration of that proposal. Okay, so final stage of a proposal is the consideration in GA plenary, which means that the assembly will then take action on the proposal. So the usual procedure on this would be the proposal, again, once that proposal is scheduled for consideration in plenary. The proposal may be introduced by a main sponsor, although this is not a requirement. Just to note that only one delegation may introduce a draft resolution. So even though there are, there could be multiple main sponsors for a proposal, there could only be one introducing delegation. If the proposal is then open for co-sponsorship, the Secretary will, as I mentioned, will invite states that have not co-sponsored the proposal on e-delegate to do so by pressing their microphone button at the plenary meeting. So the Secretary will then read out the states that press the button for co-sponsorship, and those additional co-sponsors would then be reflected in the official verbatim record of that plenary meeting. And then after that, explanation of votes. Just to note that when we say explanation of vote, the term vote does not imply that there is a recorded vote. It just means that this is an explanation of their position before the assembly takes action on a proposal. And then after explanation of votes before the vote are heard, the adoption of the proposal then would take place. So this could either happen by consensus, meaning there is no recorded vote, or through a recorded vote. After that, the Assembly will then hear explanation of votes after the vote. Also to note, delegations may only deliver an explanation of vote once. So it can only be done either before the action or after the action. And also in accordance to rule 88 of the Rules of Procedure, co-sponsors of proposal may not deliver explanation of votes. Alright, more on the voting. So here's just here just a slide showing on the rules that govern recorded votes in the GA. So first of all, who can vote in GA plenary? So each member state shall have one vote except for those who are in arrears according to the article 19 of the charter. So these are member states who are in arrears of payment. So unless the G8 has decided that they may vote, there will be countries who are in arrears who will not be able to cast their vote in the plenary or in main committees. There is also a question on which majority would apply. So sometimes there are two-thirds majority or a simple majority. So Important questions shall be made by two-thirds majority of members present and voting. So rule 83 spells out what these important questions are. So they may include recommendations with respect to the maintenance of international peace and security, admissions of new members to the UN, suspensions of rights and privileges of membership, the expulsion of members, or questions relating to the operation of trusteeship systems and budgetary questions. while rule 85 specifies that any other decisions will be made by simple majority or a majority of those members present and voting. Okay, moving on, amendments. So before we get to this slide, this is a common term that is used or that is incorrectly replaced by the term revision. So what is an amendment and what is a revision? So an amendment is a change that is proposed by a delegation to a proposal. So if delegation A has a draft resolution in front of them and delegation B wishes to amend it, they would submit an amendment. Meanwhile, a revision is a change that is proposed by the initiating delegation. So If I am delegation A and I have a proposal and I wish to change something to my proposal, then I will revise. I will make a revision to my proposal. So an amendment, therefore, is hostile in nature, while revisions are changes made by the submitting sponsor themselves. So amendments may be presented as an official written document, which will also be issued as an L document, or they could also be introduced in the Assembly as an oral amendment. So like proposals, amendments may be adopted by a recorded vote or by consensus. So just to zoom in, rule 90 of the rules of procedure states that it defines what an amendment is. And if an amendment is moved to a proposal, the GA first takes action on the amendment before it takes action on the proposal itself. And if the amendment is adopted, the proposal will then be considered as amended. either with a recorded vote or by consensus. So moving on, once the GA adopts a proposal, the proposal then becomes a resolution or a decision, and this will be issued as an official document with the symbol A/RES/ symbol, I mean the session number, slash a sequential number. So resolutions are assigned this symbol and are issued as standalone official documents. Meanwhile, adopted decisions are also assigned a symbol. It'll be the session number slash a sequential number. However, these decisions are not issued as separate documents, but they're included in a compilation of decisions adopted by the GA, which is issued at the end of the main part of the session and the resumed part of the session. So to look, to see, to find the resolutions and decisions adopted during the session, we also have these important links. They are posted on IGOV once these decision, resolutions and decisions are adopted in the GA. Okay, one important note, as you know, we have a proliferation of proposals submitted to declare international days, weeks, months, years, decades. So in the GA resolution 79327, the Assembly actually noted the significant increase in the number of these proclamations, and the GA decided through that resolution on a trial basis to put on hold consideration of new proposals for international days, weeks, months, years, and decades during the 81st and 82nd sessions. So meaning effective 81st session, the GA requests the President of the General Assembly to group all proclamation requests for these commemorations into a single resolution per agenda item, where these proposed commemorations will be an operative paragraph contained in that singular draft resolution. Accordingly, the Secretariat will not be issuing any draft resolution or decision that contains individual proclamations, requests, either in the plenary or in main committees. Okay, now I believe we have very little time left, so let me just go through quickly through my slides on elections. And also just to remind delegations that usually UNITAR would hold workshop specifically on elections sometime in April or May. that would be an opportunity for us to discuss elections in further detail. But just a very quick macro perspective on elections in the UN. So as you know, the GA, as being one of the six principal organs, conducts its own elections. And GA is the only body composed of all members of the organization. And it also elects some of the members of the Security Council, the non-permanent members of the Security Council, members of the Economic and Social Council, And it is also one of the two bodies that elect judges for the International Court of Justice. It also appoints the Secretary General of the United Nations upon the recommendation of the Security Council. So here is just a list, not an exhaustive list, but a list of many elections and appointments that are held in GA plenary. And these are held either during the main part or the resumed part of the session. And to look at the when these elections would take place, we encourage you to check the program of work of the General Assembly. But just as Kenji already mentioned, elections for the Human Rights Council members will happen in October. International Court of Justice will be the 3rd of November. We also have some elections happening the second week of November and the election of the President, Vice President of the GA, Security Council, non-permanent members and ECOSOC members happen sometime in June next year, which is part of the resumed session. Quickly, elections are held by secret ballots. However, the practice of dispensing with secret ballots has been applied whenever there is a clean slate, meaning there is an equal number of candidates that correspond to the number of seats. However, this does not apply to elections where two-thirds majority or an absolute majority is required. In those cases, for example, election of members of the Security Council and ECOSOC, those are held through secret ballot because of the required majority. Nevertheless, even though there is a clean slate, the right remains for a state to request a secret ballot should they wish to do so. And finally, just a few more things to look at. we would like to, when elections are being held, we look into the membership, you know, who can present candidatures, can candidatures be endorsed, how many seats are available and who are eligible to run for these seats, and what is the decision-making process. So on the question on who can vote, There are the 193 members of the GA, except for those countries who are in arrears subject to Article 19, who can be elected or appointment. So depending on the organ or the subsidiary body, members are elected within either in their national capacity, meaning it's the country that is elected or appointment, or in their personal capacity, meaning it's a specific individual that is elected. For example, the president of the General Assembly is elected in their personal capacity, However, the vice presidents of the General Assembly are elected in their national capacity, meaning anyone can then fulfill the role of a vice president from that member state that is elected. So two important reminders on elections held in the General Assembly. Candidates, well, candidatures must be submitted through eDelegate at least 48 hours before the election. And on the election day, campaign materials must be limited to a single page. So when distributing campaign materials in the GA Hall, they should be limited to one single sheet of printed material in view of preserving the decorum of the Assembly. And as I said, there will be a more detailed discussion on elections held by a unitar in a workshop to be held sometime in end of April or beginning of May. And with that, I think if you have a few minutes to take. UNITAR · Moderator · Rabi al-Haddad [1:22:24]: No, we don't have time. So thank you very much. What we are going to do is, with your permission, of course, share your contact details with all the colleagues. So whoever has questions, you can interact directly with Kenji and Rommel. Thank you very much. Thank you. Beatrice, thank you very much for being with us. You are the Director and Chief of Protocol. Thank you. I was searching also for an easy definition online because we all know protocol, but I was searching for that definition. I found something. It says that protocol is the art of creating an enabling environment that enables delegates, diplomats, and member states to interact through mutual respect building consensus and achieving a positive outcome to a negotiation, building trust, you know, all of these components were there. How do you see things from your perspective, you know, walk us through the protocol, whatever can lead to this, because the idea behind this and what's lurking in the background is to reinforce trust. and to focus on substance instead of having incidents or any type of friction and tension, especially next week when we are going to have the high-level segment. Thank you for being with us. And at the end, if we have time, we can open the floor for questions. Thank you. UN Secretariat · Director and Chief of Protocol · Beatrix [1:24:22]: Thank you so much, Rabi, for this introduction. And hello and welcome to all the participants in this workshop. I'm very happy to be here again this year. For me also, this is always on the day where sort of things really start rolling in preparation for a high-level week. And we have gotten a few of our extra support officers who are joining us. They are part of this briefing today as well. And, you know, and it's going to be very busy time going forward. So if we could just show the first slide, please. And then, thanks for the introduction. Indeed, it seems as if you had been-- who's running the thing? Do I run it from here or-- OK. There we go. It seems as if you had already seen my first slide. Because for me, it's protocol, people always think protocol is just formality. Yeah, these people, they go on the stage and they do this and they really get paid for this. And it is so important to think and reflect a moment. Why are we doing all the things we are doing? And especially the place like here at the United Nations, where we have 193 member states and then observers, and we need to treat everybody equally. We need to be there invisibly and, you know, effectively in the background in order for the events to proceed seamlessly and in order for us to get the results from the negotiations which are taking place here, and also the pictures that reflect what we are doing and give an idea to the wider public of what we are doing. And that's how I have constructed my first slide. If you look up in the picture in the center, that's the Vienna Congress, which kind of is the beginning of modern diplomacy and modern protocol, if you want. And of course, bottom left picture, you all know the ambassador's residence and these dinners that they are organizing where you may have been invited or assisted in organizing them, and it's all very formal and set. And that all has its place, and there's a reason I give you a little bit of tools to handle these situations as well in this briefing. But it is so much more. We're looking at protocol today much more in the context of event management, right, picking the right venue, making sure the participants get there and get there in time. Who's speaking when and in what order and why? We help with the seating arrangement. We organize the flags. And the bottom right corner picture is in order to show that events today, they don't need to be these formal seated dinners in the ambassador's residence all the time, right? Especially for us in the United Nations, but maybe also for your countries. It is about getting the broader audience to the table. It's not only the member states, it's also civil society. And that can be reflected also in the events you're organizing. Invite a local vendor to provide the food for a dinner you're doing. Maybe do a different setting. I was once, when I was in my previous life as a German diplomat, we were invited to an event from the host country where I served, and they had little food stands of small enterprises, you know, mostly women who were providing the food for this diplomatic event. I thought this was very thoughtful and something to be kept in mind. But before we dive into this, I just want to show you a little bit about High Level Week, especially for those of you who are new. This is what the General Assembly Hall will look like on Tuesday next week, quite different from what you've probably seen if you've been there to any other meeting. It will run over. You know, there will be people standing on the sides, although we don't allow that. The balcony will be full. Everybody will be there, especially on the first morning of High-Level Week. The whole place will be buzzing of energy. We will have the member states, the observer organizations, representatives of the UN system, and invitees of the countries who are speaking in the morning. The Curb, and that's the picture on the left corner on the top, There you will see my colleagues, the special protocol officers, who will be receiving the delegations, high-level delegations arriving and accompanying them to their first venue. then if their first venue should be the speaking slot in the General Assembly in General Assembly Hall, there's a room behind the gold wall, which is called the GA 200. And I guess very few of you have seen it yet. This is what it looks like inside, top right picture. It's like a green room, if you want, if you're familiar with the parlance of event management. This is where we hold the speakers and one person extra. Sometimes there's other people as well. This is a very crowded moment, you see there. And that gives the presidents, heads of state, heads of government time to focus on their speech, prepare themselves, and also to meet each other. That's the moment we captured there. And then, of course, bottom right corner, at some point, the door opens and we escort the head of state, head of government, minister out on the stage for him or her to deliver their formal address to the General Assembly. If it's a head of state, he will be accompanied by honor guards as well, or she, heads of vice presidents and below, that we don't have the honor guards. And the bottom left corner, I included that picture just to raise one particular point, which is this whole building was constructed at a time when accessibility was not really an issue, unfortunately. So therefore, many of the venues here are not, to say it mildly, not ideal for anybody who has accessibility issues. And we, from protocol, but also all my colleagues from conference management, we try to accommodate everybody to the best of our possibilities. For instance, in the General Assembly Hall, sometimes if you look really closely, you will see the seating is alphabetical, but there's something has been switched, and that is often to give a particular delegation an accessible seat where an ambassador, for instance, in a wheelchair can have access, or the picture that I'm showing you there is actually in GA200. To get a person with a wheelchair out on the stage is pretty easy, but There was a wheelchair lift which has only been constructed two, three years ago, which also allows a person in a wheelchair to get actually higher than the rostrum, which is marble, as you know, and preset. So all of these details are also part of what my team and I are doing. A few more pictures just to give you a flair of High-Level Week. This is the press point coming into the building through the delegates' entrance. You will know it from the TV coverage of High-Level Week, especially when the U.S. President is arriving and everybody goes, "Mr. President, Mr. President," and sometimes he stops and sometimes he doesn't. Top right corner, Secretary-General and his close team running from one meeting to another. That's, of course, for him, it's one of the most challenging weeks always because there's so many demands on his schedule, in addition to him being in the General Assembly Hall and then also participating in the debate to some extent. We have a complex bilateral program for the Secretary-General where he meets all the representative of the respective countries, heads of state, heads of government, sometimes even ministers in short segments. Normally the meeting is scheduled for 10 minutes. And it's really my colleagues up there, they're really running, I would say, somebody called it diplomatic speed dating at some point. So it's really one meeting after the other, and I'll show you a little slide on that in a moment. President of the General Assembly presiding, bottom left picture, you see him gaveling a meeting with the famous gavel, which is from Iceland. And on the bottom right corner, too much to my chagrin, there is no heads of state luncheon again this year. I think the last one we had in 2019. Then COVID came, and ever since, I think it was more the financial rules of this institution that made it impossible to have one again this year. But, you know, we can always hope maybe next year. Of course, before we go into High-Level Week, there's a few events that are taking place beforehand. Just last week, as I was saying, the President of the General Assembly was sworn in, he took his oath of office. There was a handover of a report with the previous president of the General Assembly, and that famous gavel that I was talking about was handed over as well. For the UN, we always have a meeting which is called the Dag Hammarskjold wreath-laying ceremony, which thinks of Secretary General Dag Hammarskjold, who was killed in an accident. And there's always an annual ceremony where we commemorate him. And then there's the Peace Bell ceremony every year, reminding us why the United Nations is there, where both the Secretary-General and the President of the General Assembly ring that Peace Bell, which was donated by Japan It's in the garden on the ground floor. If you haven't seen it, it's very beautiful, Japanese garden outside as well. But now focusing back on General Assembly preparation, middle top picture is colleagues of mine preparing the seating arrangement for the opening, for the high level week and also for all the consecutive meetings taking place there. Showing this, if you are organizing together with colleagues, an event throughout the year in the J Hall, there's also the possibility to assign VIP seating. In that case, you'd communicate with the other organizers, the names to us, and we'll help you develop a seating plan there. And then on, when is it, Thursday, all of you working for the mission should have that already penciled into your calendar. It's the famous goody bag distribution. That is when we hand out the access cards for the various meetings during High-Level Week. If you were in my briefing, when was it, end of August, about High-Level Week in general, logistical preparations, you know this year is going to be much, much easier. we will require secondary access cards for the General Assembly basically throughout the week, General Assembly Hall for the second floor throughout the week, and for all other meeting rooms only if a meeting takes place on Tuesday. In other words, if your principal wants to attend a meeting In the Aquasoc on Thursday, it is perfectly possible to get there without a secondary access card. Only the access route may be different. So you're not coming through the second floor, you may have to come from the third floor, but it is possible. But so the pictures you're seeing in top right is goody bag distribution and top left is how we pack the goody bags, all of these thousands of cards going into the different envelopes. If you walk around anywhere in the headquarters during this week, you will see big groups like the one in the bottom right doing walkthroughs. Walkthroughs are offered to all delegations, mostly in groups, where we run you through the respective events during High-Level Week. They're mostly offered to delegations who are getting advanced teams from capital, from protocol, from security, et cetera, but we have a few also accessible to embassies. And then bottom left, I choose that picture because you see the teleprompter, right? You see this little glass thing, that's the teleprompter. And there's teleprompter rehearsals, which are also offered, I think it's Saturday this week. And more information about all of these things you can find in the inf node, the information node, which gives you all the logistical arrangements. access cards. I jump over that here pretty quickly, as we said, not too many this year. And then this is a slide that gives you the layout of the General Assembly and Echo sock chamber for the morning of Tuesday. There we have a reception which is offered by the Secretary General to all heads of state and heads of government. Also, vice presidents would be included in that group. Unfortunately, if your delegation is headed by a minister, we can unfortunately not accommodate them in that reception. This gives you the flow of the delegations. All of these slides are available with much more information on our homepage, and you should really check those out. And the other thing is there's a QR code on the top corner, and that gives you a virtual walkthrough. So the QR code is really something that you might want to keep. It's also on our homepage. It gives you a good idea as to how things really look when you arrive as a delegation, how it looks when you go up on the 27th floor for the bilateral meeting with the Secretary General, et cetera. And that more people take the pictures. But again, it's all on the homepage. This is what it looks like for this reception on Tuesday morning. So first, the principals will be greeted by the Secretary General, the Deputy Secretary General, and the chef de cabinet, and then they take a picture, which is the one you see on the left. And then we accompany them out through the Equesop chamber to the delegates' lounge, where we have at that time a VVIP reception, if you want, standing tables. Only heads of state and heads of government are allowed there. No ambassadors, no accompanying personnel other than vital interpreters. And that is where we hold everybody until approximately five to 10 minutes before nine. We try to invite everybody to proceed to the General Assembly Hall for the start of the debate at nine o'clock. This slide, just to remind you that there is the possibility to book booths for bilateral meetings. These booths are being constructed as we speak in the visitors lobby. There is a particular homepage set up where you can reserve these booths. That's meant by a sister division of ours. All that information is in the inf note as well. And there you can schedule bilateral meetings between your head of delegation and another delegation. Now, looking a little bit outside of High-Level Week, but also partly inside High-Level Week, What I've briefed so far was mostly focused on the General Assembly, high level debate itself. But of course, we also do other events at headquarters. And if you are co-organizing one of those or have somebody attending one of those, then you will most likely be in touch with our team at some point. I like to show the picture on the top right, because it shows you how versatile the General Assembly Hall is. It's amazing, isn't it? I mean, you have this gold dome, and with the right light, and actually the right money to pay for that lighting, because I can tell you that's very, very expensive, you can transform it into a fantastic venue for even visual presentations. And I think the one I'm showing is from the Education Summit. some years ago. They've done similar things for the climate summit, and I think we have something planned also for this year. And there's also the possibility to add a stage extension to the General Assembly podium, if you want, or not, like the stage itself. So you can bring that stage extension in. That's where you see this Devos-style seating in the bottom right corner. which gives you a bit more space. Not ideal. Sometimes they even cover the first row of seats. So if you do that, you will not be able to assign a seat to each and every member state by name. But if you have an event that has, you know, hashtag seating, free seating for everybody, that works. And the left one is just we had-- that was King of the Netherlands and President of Tajikistan. I think the water summit was another one we had here, where we did, together with member states, a special event here in the General Assembly Hall. presentation of credentials, another time of the year where you might be in contact with my team. We brief the incoming new permanent representatives prior to them, then presenting credentials to the Secretary General. And that's a few of the pictures you are seeing here. And then, of course, even throughout the year, the Secretary General and will be receiving visitors for bilateral meetings, either they take place in the conference room on the 38th floor, that's on the right-hand side, or on the 27th floor during high-level week and special other occasions. And the flags, just to show you, we only flag the national flag for heads of state, not for vice presidents, not for heads of government. This is this famous 27th floor that I briefed you about, just to show you there's a number of holding rooms, especially during high-level week, which we will ask your delegation to be in already 15 minutes prior to the start of the meeting. And then we accompany everybody to the meeting room itself, and then you exit on the other side. Again, this is very nicely covered in the QR code with a little video taking you through that floor. Because we got a lot of questions about flag use throughout the year, I wanted to focus on that a little bit more. But also, I wanted to say in this context, our unit protocol is a service unit, right? So, if you have any issue, any protocol question, do not hesitate to contact us. UN Protocol has a general mailbox. If you send us a question there or call one of my team, we always try to help you with whatever protocol issue you may have. I just ask you to please give us a few days in advance. Sometimes we get these messages, "Oh, we are having this dinner now, and we need you to help do us the seating arrangement." That's kind of late, right? But if you give us, like you have a seating arrangement, a standing arrangement for a photo op already prepared, but you're not sure about one particular aspect of things, do call us, do send us a question, and we'll be happy to help you and give you a few elements how to answer that. Another thing I wanted to point out in that context is actually protocol is not an exact science, right? There's hardly ever a thing where you can say this is wrong and this is right. You often have conflicting rules and precedents, and then you have to advise your principal to take the right decision. You take the decision, you make a draft, and then you give the arguments to your principal who has to develop it, right? Why am I not speaking first is the question here you will get, and then you need to have your arguments ready. But before we go into that, a couple of flags that are not quite correct. I hope nobody took pictures of that slide. Because all of these have issues. Anybody brave enough to point out an issue? Just talk. No? Nobody? Okay. So, first one, right corner. You shouldn't tie flags. It's not, a flag is, you know, it's like an honor system of a country. So this sort of tying it together, please don't. Then the left top one, that's easy. If you come to my office now, you see part of my team and they are actually steaming the flags because this is so wrinkled and not really properly spread. So please make sure when you use a flag that it looks proper, which the one in the bottom left corner looks very proper, very nice. It's just the wrong order, and I'll go into that in just a moment. And the bottom right, what I don't like about that one is the tassels, that gold stuff around the flag, because the UN flag code, and I'm sure many other countries have that as well, has a provision where it says the United Nations flag shall not be festooned. So that means no gold tassels. I know other countries have the tassels. It's a sign of particular honor, but we don't. So just drawing that for fun. And then If you do flags properly, and I'm not going into the details of all of those, they add a lot to the respective pictures, right? And there's different countries doing them differently. The U.S. what is it? Yes, U.S. China one, you know, they double and triple the flags. It gives a very nice backdrop. European Union countries, they will always add the European Union flag, you know, so it If it's done properly, it really gives you a lot of visuals. But back to the basics. So everything you need to know about the use of the UN flag, you find in the UN flag code. That's a public document. You see the source up there. And I just wanted to give you the principle. which is that as a host, the flag of the guest should be on your right hand side from the perspective of the person, the host, if you want. So if I'm the United Nations, when I'm the Secretary General standing in front of that flag, on the right hand side, there should be the flag of the guest. And the other way around, if an organization receives the UN, then the UN flag is on the right hand side. Always put yourself in the person who will be standing in the shoes of the person who will be standing in front of the flag, looking at the photographer, and then the position of honor is on your right hand side. Very easy, making it a bit more concrete. So this is left side is what it looks like upstairs when the Secretary General receives a high level delegation. So our flag is on the right-hand side, and if you then, the Secretary-General standing in front of it, on your right-hand side, the bottom left corner is Guatemala, it's the Guatemala flag. And then top right corner, the opposite, right? Secretary General visiting the African Union, their flag is on the right hand side. And then from the perspective of the chairperson of the African Union Commission at the time, Mr. Faki, on his right hand side is then the UN flag, this time again with tassels. Sorry about that. I could not stop that in time. The bottom right corner, just to confuse you completely, some countries do it exactly the opposite way around. And I think in Asian countries, it's pretty prevalent to do this sort of crossover thing, which is what the previous Secretary General, Ban Ki-moon, did. So this is an old picture, just showing you that flags, there's a lot of very complicated rules. If you're doing flags in a picture, take your time to think it through, take your time to see what's important for your country and what the flag code says, and then do it properly is my strict advice. This one I'm going to skip over. It's when you have a specialized agency also participating in a meeting, they have their own flags. And then one last point, and I see the next speaker is already here, trying not to run over too much. Just wanted to focus on the order of precedence a little bit. So If you are to organize any sort of group, and that can be a guest list, a speakers list, you need to find a principle, a first principle to order your list. Of course, in the United Nations, very easy, what we use a lot is alphabetical, no explanation needed. You can also do something chronological. Diplomatic community often is-- the PRs are often ordered by the time they have presented their credentials. So the more-- the earlier you presented, the more senior you are. Then if you look at speakers list, General Assembly High-Level Week, the principle we're using there is hierarchical, if you want. So first, the heads of states, then the vice president, then the heads of government, and the deputy prime ministers, and then the ministers, right? Then the last, the next two, this is more for social events, right? There you can always decide to pull the female participants forward. So in traditional seating for dinners, for instance, the spouse would always be higher than the function holder. So to move away from female and male to function holder and spouse, but this is maybe a little bit disappearing at the moment. However, you always give the better seat to the guests. That's for sure. So when you go into a meeting room, for instance, there's one that faces the wall and another one that faces the window. You would give the seat that faces the window to your guests because it's just considered the better seat, right? And then last point, another principle is member states go before observer states, before observer organizations. That's again something we do here in the UN a lot. Now, you will have, of course, conflicting information, right? You're doing a seating, so you have You can have something that points to have give this person a higher precedence, and another factor would give another person a higher precedence. So this is where this, what I said before, comes into play, right? You have to figure out what kind of event is it you're organizing, which principle makes the most sense in your context, and then be able to defend your decision. And that is why it's so important. Protocol never works in a vacuum, right? It's never just, yeah, go to the list and then this is how it's done. No, you have to understand what kind of event you're doing, what's the context, what's the outcome you as an organizer would like to achieve, and then you play with the different parameters until you get the result for the seating arrangement for the order of speakers that you would like. Simple order of precedence amongst United Nations organizations you can find on our homepage again. Suffice to say, the thing that gets sometimes a bit confusing is the placement of specialized agencies and funds of programs. Specialized agencies go before funds and programs, and specialized agencies are grouped according to the rank, according to the time when they agreement with the United Nations came into effect and funds and programs according to the time of the establishment. This is important if you have like a, let's say, a discussion where you have a lot of UN heads, for instance, attending. And then coming to my last chapter, photo opportunities. I just wanted to show you a couple of pictures to demonstrate how our world has changed and how the United Nations has changed, right? The left picture is a picture from a historic United Nations gathering. So you can see everybody was drinking, smoking, they were white, and they were male. And on the right-hand side is kind of the same thing. And then if I look at photo ops that I'm trying to do today, this is a picture of the resident coordinators of the United Nations system taken a few years ago, which shows you how different a picture looks today and how, you know, it's important to show that also in pictures. So if we're doing, for instance, formal photos with a group of people with the Secretary General, we always make sure that we pull the women forward in order also to make that point that we are that we want to achieve equal distribution. And so even against protocol rank, we always pull the woman forward. So with that, I think I come to the end of my presentation. Sorry to rush you through that. Again, I just wanted to whet your appetite a little bit for all the things protocol. We are here, we are here for you, and let us know if you have any questions today or after this briefing, or then any time during the next year, my team is here for you. Thank you. UNITAR · Moderator · Rabi al-Haddad [1:55:47]: Thank you very much, Beatrix, for this impactful, insightful, how can I say, condensed, straight to the point type of presentation. I, we won't have time for questions, answers because we're running behind time. How, how would you like us to take it forward if some of the delegates have questions, how can they reach out to you directly? UN Secretariat · Director and Chief of Protocol · Beatrix [1:56:06]: Presentation. So we will send you the presentation, which has the QR code and a couple of the slides. And also it will contain a slide which has our homepage and our web address. Again, then just reach out to us directly if you need anything. So I'm not just reviewing a book, you know, which gives you all the wisdom on protocol, rather just a few things to remember and then We can advise you also if you need that on any books that are available that make sense, but that's a hard one. UNITAR · Moderator · Rabi al-Haddad [1:56:41]: Thank you very much. Thank you. Speaker 15 [1:56:46]: Thanks, Fabienne. Thank you. UNITAR · Moderator · Rabi al-Haddad [1:58:37]: So let's continue, dear colleagues. We have right now the overview of the work of main committees, and we have two dear colleagues with us, Ms. Sonia Elliott, who is Chief, Disarmament and Peace Affairs Branch, General Assembly and ECOSOC Affairs Division, and we have also Ms. Emer Herity, who is Secretary of ECOSOC Affairs Branch, General Assembly and ECOSOC Affairs Division, Department for General Assembly and Conference Management. Thank you both for being with us. Before I give you the floor, I just have a question. I was discussing a long time ago with a colleague who joined the United Nations in 1946, and I think that person knew also Dr. Diallo, Jibril, who was with us this morning. And if my memory doesn't betray me, he mentioned that at the beginning in 1946, there were 50 agenda items. So nowadays, we just learned from Dr. Diallo that we have 170. When you are walking us through the work of the main committees, Please allow us to understand how is this impacting the work of delegates, you see, in terms of intensity and workload. Thank you. The floor is yours. UN Secretariat · Chief, Disarmament and Peace Affairs Branch · Sonia Elliott [1:59:45]: Thank you so much. And, well, first of all, let me begin by thanking UNITAR for extending an invitation to us. We are very pleased to join you this morning. And also to extend a warm welcome to all new delegates to the UN and to wish you a successful and productive, well, not upcoming anymore, but 81st session of the Assembly. I will come to the question just posed by Rabbi with respect to the number of agenda items. But let me mention that Emer, my colleague and I, we've decided to divide our work, our presentations on the six main committees. I will look at the first, the fourth, and the sixth, while Emer will address in her presentation the second, the third, and the sixth. And let me just make sure that-- yes. And we will start with the rules of procedure, which you see on the screen there. You would notice that the current rules of procedures, rule 98, lists the six main committees. Compare that to 1957, where we had more main committees. and a slight change in terms of the naming of those committees. So we have made changes over the years as it relates to the rules of procedure and the names of the main committees. Let me start with the first committee. And I always recommend that delegations know who are representing them on the main committees. Your chair and bureau, that is the vice chairs and rapporteurs, they're responsible for the smooth conduct of all meetings. you have questions, you have proposals, you should know who from your specific region represents you on the main committee. So in the case of the first committee, you see that Asia Pacific group is represented at the level of chair by His Excellency, the permanent representative of Nepal, Africa by the representative of the Sudan, Eastern Europe, Armenia, and the Netherlands for the WEALL group. When the elections took place a few months ago, unfortunately, we were unable to elect a vice chair from GRULAC. We do have a nominee from Antigua and Barbuda, and we expect that election to take place at the organizational meeting in three weeks' time. I mentioned that the Bureau is responsible for the program of work, but that proposal by the Bureau, the final proposal by the Bureau, is informed by a decision taken that previous session, in this case, the 80th session. And in the case of the first committee, it was decision 8515. The Bureau looks at that proposal and then makes a recommendation for the programme of work based on that proposal, and that is issued as conference room paper CRP1 in the case of the First Committee. This programme of work is formally approved, adopted by the First Committee at its first organizational meeting, which is scheduled for the 5th of October. The first committee meets in conference room 4 and it shares resources with the fourth committee. So both committees meet in conference room 4. If the first committee is meeting in the morning, the fourth committee meets in the afternoon. And sometimes we, the first committee may have meetings all day, the fourth committee will not meet and the same for the fourth committee. What is distinct about the First Committee is that its work is divided into three distinctive stages. The first, it has a general debate on all of the agenda items allocated to it by the General Assembly, followed by a thematic discussion, and then the Committee takes action on all proposals before it. This year, we are expecting approximately 80 proposals, given the fact that we have about 79 agenda items that have been allocated to the committee. While we will begin on the 5th of October, we expect to conclude our work on the 3rd of November. So it's basically four weeks of deliberations for a total of 29 meetings. And these are the agenda items that have been allocated to the first committee. Usually, the, well, not usually, the General Assembly allocates all items under the heading 8G, sorry, of its agenda, disarmament. to the first committee, with the exception of, and you see it struck through here, the report of the International Atomic Energy Agency. This report is considered directly in plenary meeting, and in fact, we have an arrangement in place where we where the plenary tries to schedule its meeting on this item when the first committee is not meeting in order to ensure that first committee delegates can be there in the jail to to to participate in the debate. But you'll see from these items that the committee deals with a wide range of disarmament and international security items, ranging from military budgets, nuclear weapon-free zones, arms race in outer space, the role of science and technology in the context of international security and disarmament, which is a big topic right now. You've heard the recent debate taking place on AI. conventions, international conventions aimed at disarmament and international security. In addition, you see at the end here, items 124, 139, these organizational items together with an item on election of officers are allocated to all six main committees. Documentation. We have divided documents that we recommend that you look at in three distinct categories. Before the session starts, we would encourage you to look at the GA annotated agenda. You will have had a briefing earlier today on that. The allocation of items to the committee will be issued as C1811. All of the items that I just showed you will be in that document. All of the reports that have been issued by the Secretary General, subsidiary bodies are listed in the documents of the first committee in one. I mentioned to you already the program of work in CRP 1, but there's also CRP 2, which is a timetable for the thematic discussion, which is the second segment of the work of the first committee. And given the fact that working methods is very important, program planning, equally important, The Secretariat produces this document in four, and it addresses the question that Mr. El-Haddad posed to me, what do we do with the fact that there's so many agenda items right now, and how do we deal with this? So in this document, AC 181 in four, we actually listed all of the agenda items of the 80th session, and we actually indicate those that had substantive edits and those that simply had technical edits. And the reason why we have included that chart in this document, it's because earlier this year, the first committee had a discussion on its working methods, a discussion on binarization, triangularization of items. And there was a call to look closely at the draft proposals that may just be edited technically every year and whether they can be banalized, trivialized, et cetera. Of course, each member state has the right to put forward a proposal, but in providing this information in a document, It is our hope that the committee can make an informed decision as to how they will deal with the wide gamut of agenda items before them. Now, in session documents for all of the main committees, you have the L documents, basically the draft resolutions and decisions. In the case of the first committee, we have a couple of CRPs. that are produced for the third part, the third segment of its work, the action phase. There's a list of all of the draft resolutions for action, and that's important because of the large number of proposals that the first committee normally deals with. So it's easy for member states. It's all about we're here to make things as easy as possible for you. And then we also have a CRP on the program of work for the following session. And an informal paper that we produce that would inform delegations what are the proposals that action will be taken on every day during that action phase. So that There is no misunderstanding. We have the list of proposals. We indicate if there's a PBI attached to the proposal, if there's a request for a vote, if it's a vote on just the proposal or separate votes. And once the session ends, there are two additional documents that we prepare. Well, actually three. The list of proposals contained in the report, the rapporteur's report, on the rapporteur's report last year for the first time, instead of having a rapporteur's report on each agenda item, we streamlined the process and produced one rapporteur's report that touches on all of the items allocated to the first committee. Then to facilitate action in the General Assembly, we produce a document in three, which basically lists all of the proposals under the chronologically under the items. And then, of course, the list of participants. I have gone through this with you already, the three distinct phases of the work of the first committee. Within four weeks, this is how it is divided. I have touched on the fact that there's a high number of proposals in the first committee, but there's also a high degree of voting in the first committee, one of the highest of the six main committees. And in this case, I have reflected voting for the 80th session. And you would notice in black, it relates to the 80th session. The red, the numbers in red relate to the session before, the 79th session. So for the 80th session, there were 63 draft proposals. Of the 63 draft proposals, 49 of them, the majority, were voted upon. However, it's a bit more complicated than simply 49 proposals voted upon. For each proposal voted upon, there were requests for separate votes. an operative paragraph, a preamble paragraph, et cetera. Last year, there were 116 requests for separate votes. So just in terms of the numbers, you see there how many times the first committee actually voted last year. And this is why the informal papers that we produce, very important, so the delegations can keep track as to what it is that they're voting on, how they have to vote, and not be in a state of confusion during the action phase. Voting procedure, it's the same for all of the main committees. But in the case of the first committee, given the fact that there's an action phase where all of the proposals are being considered at the same time, what happens is that we provide an opportunity for delegations to first have, to first present, introduce their draft proposal before action. So we have a cluster of, say, for example, 15 draft proposals that will be considered on a given at a given meeting. There's an opportunity to main sponsors to introduce the draft. Then we have explanations of vote by delegations. Main sponsors cannot explain their votes. Their proposal, it's basically their vote. So if they would like to say a few additional words on their proposals, they take the opportunity of the introductory part, that first segment to introduce as opposed to explaining their votes. And this is mentioned in the third bullet here, sponsors may make general statements at the beginning, but they cannot explain their vote. Once the explanation of vote before the vote takes place, the committee proceeds with action on the proposals one by one. So if there are 15 draft proposals for action at a given meeting, we start with the first proposal, chronological, and we would proceed based on the request. So it may be a vote on the L itself, or it may be a vote on a preambular or the other part of the resolution. And once we go through all of those draft resolutions and the voting, there's an opportunity for delegations to explain their vote after the vote. Here again, main sponsors, sponsors cannot explain their vote. And once that cluster has been completed, we have the explanation of vote after the vote, we proceed to the next cluster. And there are seven thematic clusters in the first committee. We encourage you, if you are covering the first committee, to look at the link on eDelegate on first committee place, as well as the public site. Let me now proceed to the fourth committee. Okay, Fourth Committee. You would see this slide basically shows that the Fourth Committee as we know it now emerged in 1993 as a special political and decolonization committee, replacing the Trusteeship Committee and the Special Political Committee. These are the items that are allocated to the fourth committee. One moment, please. Okay. Okay. It's okay. Thank you. Okay. So these are the items of the fourth committee. And So from atomic radiations, the review of special political missions, and here again, you see the three items that are allocated to all six main committees, the election of officers, revitalization, under which the Program of Working Methods is considered, as well as program planning, where the Committee has an opportunity to look at the recommendations of the Committee for Program and Coordination. These three items in the Fourth Committee are not considered annually. And in fact, this year, the joint panel with the first committee on possible challenges to space security and sustainability will take place. Program and organization of work, I mentioned to you when I did the presentation on the first committee that the decision on the program for the upcoming session was done at the 80th session. You see the decision here for the fourth committee, 8518. In recent years, the main committees have faced the challenge of the liquidity strictures imposed by the financial situation of the organization. And we have had to reduce the number of meetings by 20% on all six main committees. I have already mentioned the first committee and fourth committee share resources. So interpretation room, conference room four, shared between the two committees. And like the first committee, the fourth committee final program of work, organization of work, will be considered at its organizational meeting, which is scheduled for the first of October. It's a bit tiny, but this is what the program looks like for the fourth committee on a daily basis. And this is the Bureau. The African region is chairing. His Excellency, the Permanent Representative of Senegal is the chair. The vice chairs are from Asia Pacific, WEORG, as well as Eastern Europe, the rapporteurs from Latin America and the Caribbean, and the Secretary of the Fourth Committee, my colleague, Claudia Gross. Documentation, similar to the First Committee, these are the items that we, these are the documents that we recommend that you look at before the session. During the session, of course, the L documents are issued and post-session, similar to the first committee, there is an INF 3, as well as the rapporteur's report. The difference between the fourth and the first committee is If you were to look at the pre-session documents, there is a reference, the last bullet point on the pre-session to summary records. All main committees have summary records with the exception of the first committee, which has verbatim records. And the verbatim records, instead of SR.number, it's PV.number, similar to the plenary. Where to find documentation? the public webpage, e-delegate, as well as documents.un.org. These are the bodies that submit reports to the Fourth Committee, a wide range of subsidiary bodies, C24, the Committee on the Peaceful Use of Outer Space, C34 on peacekeeping, And unlike the first committee, what happens in the fourth committee is that they consider the agenda items one after the other. You have the debate on the item and then action on the proposal submitted under the item, and then they proceed to the next agenda item. The only exceptions listed at the bottom of this slide are the items relating to decolonization. They are considered as a whole, the debate. The UNWRA and Israeli practices items, while there are separate general debates on these two, action on all draft proposals is basically taken as a whole. And then the peacekeeping item. Action is normally taken the following year during the resumed session when the report of the C34 is considered. Informal consultations for all of the six main committees you find in the journal as well as in e-delegate. In terms of draft proposals for For all of the main committees, you have two sources, the subsidiary bodies that report to the main committee, or a member state decides to present a proposal. And in the slide here, we remind you to submit a track change version. So An issued version, you basically use that as a template and you input any edits to that document. A track change version and then a clean version for us to process. The deadline for submission of these proposals will be contained in the organization program of work. Co-sponsorship, it's done through eDelegate. On e-delegate 2, you would find all information relating to who's the main sponsors, who are the co-sponsors. Similar to the first committee, there are Proposals that require a vote in the Fourth Committee, about a half of the draft resolutions submitted on the decolonization items, as well as the draft proposals on the UNWA and Israeli practices. Last year, last session, the Committee adopted 40 draft proposals, 20 of which were adopted by a vote. As the secretariat, if there is voting, we do ask that you come to the conference room in good time. Once voting starts, you cannot interrupt the voting unless it's on a point of order relating to the conduct of the vote. what does the conduct of vote mean? Say, for example, you're pressing your button, but it's not reflected on the screen that your country is voting. But you cannot interrupt to say, well, Madam Chair, Mr. Chair, we wanted to co-sponsor this draft proposal. That's not allowed according to the rules of procedure. And once the vote has closed, No change is possible to the proposal. It now becomes the property of the committee. It's no longer the draft proposal of country X. It's a draft proposal of the fourth committee or the first committee. And it's these draft proposals that the General Assembly will take action on as recommendations of these main committees. But if you do make a mistake while voting, you can submit a voting intention via e-delegate, and that change will be reflected in the rapporteur's report. Opportunities for statements, we've already spoken about general statements, EOVs, and EOVs after the vote. 17, the fourth committee examines the question of 17 non-self-governing territories. You have the map there where these territories are located, and this is the actual listing of the territories. The fourth committee is unique in the sense that they have a special hearing for petitioners. Petitioners can be individuals or representatives of civil society, and they can petition, that is, make a statement relating to one of the 17 non-self-governing territories. Information is provided adequately in advance as to the deadline for inscription to be a petitioner. You would see here the steady increase with respect to the number of petitioners that come to make presentations before the Fourth Committee. You'd notice from 2021 to 2026, the number of petitioners actually doubled in size. So a great amount of time is spent in the committee listening to petitioners. E-tools, you've heard about e-delegates. There, you could find e-speakers, e-sponsorship, e-list of participants, the fourth committee space, place. And of course, the journal, documents.un.org and iGov. Please do look at the public web page, the archives for previous webcasts. press releases, and you have an e-mail here for the fourth committee secretariat. The fifth committee, and this is my final committee. You see here the legislative mandate of that committee. Article 17, very clear. about the role of the General Assembly when it comes to the budget of the organization. And GA Resolution 45248B, Section 6, is also very clear that it's the Fifth Committee that has the responsibility for administrative and budgetary matters. We've highlighted in yellow an important rule that all the committees observe. No proposal is voted upon until its financial implications are assessed. The implications are assessed And we have there and there are three options in terms of the response. There are no financial implications. There are financial implications, but the implications can be absorbed by the secretariat. And the third option is that there are PBIs, the famous PBI program budget implications. When there's a program budget implication, that proposal of the committee Would need to be considered by the fifth committee before final action in the General Assembly. So, although it's announced in the main committee, there's a PBI attached to this proposal and we take action. Final action by the General Assembly when a symbol is actually assigned to the draft resolution or decision. For those with PBIs, the, you have to wait until the Fifth Committee pronounces on, on them. And this is what this slide is about. PBIs, the Fifth Committee has a deadline of 1 December for submission of all draft resolutions with PBIs. And usually, FYI, it's usually around Christmas time, Christmas Eve, that the GA would finally take a decision on the proposals with PBIs of the remaining five main committees. Three sessions of the fifth committee. They meet during the main part of the session, like the other five main committees, from October to December. But then, unlike the autumn main committees, there is a resumed part in March for five weeks when the committee will look at items that they had not concluded consideration of during the main part. They also look at human resources management as well as items such as procurement, air travel, etc. The second resumed session. It's in May, and this is all about financing peacekeeping operations, peacekeeping and oversight reports. These are the subsidiary bodies of the Fifth Committee. What's unique about the Fifth Committee is that they actually conduct elections in that committee, which is not the case in the other two committees that I made presentations on. And unlike the former two committees too, the Fifth Committee takes most of its decisions by consensus. There is GA Resolution 41213, which explicitly states that it's desirable that the Fifth Committee should continue to make all possible efforts with a view to establishing the broadest possible agreement. And that would explain why it takes such a long time for them to present their reports to the Assembly for final decision. For more information on organization of work and work methods, please do consult the Fifth Committee website. I've spoken about the public website, eDelegate. This slide goes into more detail as to what you can find on those sites. And that's my presentation. Thank you very much. UNITAR · Moderator · Rabi al-Haddad [2:35:35]: Thank you very much, Sonia. If Emer is ready, we can move forward directly. Thank you. UN Secretariat · Secretary, ECOSOC Affairs Branch · Emer Herity [2:35:56]: Thank you, and good afternoon. Thank you for inviting me. As Sonia mentioned, I'm going to speak on the second, third, and sixth committees. My presentation is rather more brief. A lot of what Sonia presented on the first and the fourth, and also the fifth, is actually applicable across the board. Of course, each main committee has its own specificities. Sonia referred to rule 98 of the GA rules of procedures, and this is the current listing and the names of the main committees. What am I I know you already had a presentation on the GA Rules of Procedure, but just to say or repeat that it's Rules 99 to 133 that applies to the work of the main committees. The GA has established a rotation for the officers of the main committees. That was established in resolution 72/313, which covered basically 10 sessions. So there is a planning basis to know from which region the chairs, vice chairs and rapporteur will come. In the 79th session, the GA decided to continue that established pattern. So for the next 10 sessions, it's already known the regional rotation. At the 66th session, in resolution 66/246, it was decided that the formal meetings of Main Committee should be webcast. So you have, of course, if you're attending Main Committee, you should be in the conference rooms, but the meetings are webcast, but the archived webcasts are also a resource if you need to check proceedings of previous sessions. Sonia mentioned that the two agenda items, the revitalization of the work of the General Assembly and program planning are allocated not just to the plenary, but also to each of the main committees. And maybe in relation to the question you raised at the beginning on the agenda items and how the agenda and mandates of the Assembly have grown over recent years. And actually, the number you mentioned doesn't give the full picture because many items have sub-items within themselves. So I think the count would run to a few hundred, probably, the full count. So there is the working group of the GA, which is now called the Working Group on Strengthening and Revitalizing the Work of the General Assembly. The latest resolution of that working group was 79/327. And that resolution, as well as previous resolutions, have mandated each main committee to look at their working methods, to look at the items assigned, to consider making recommendations on periodicity. So there is a mandate, a standing mandate, to each main committee to really look at the items assigned and possibly make recommendations. Specifically, the mandate is to make recommendations to the General Committee from this session. There's also, and I don't know if it comes up in another presentation, the GA established the Working Group on Mandate Implementation Review that under which was adopted resolution 8251. That working group continues its work. During the 81st session, the co-chairs, the PRs of Jamaica and Norway were reappointed. And that's another, I would say, maybe the main setting or context where the whole question of mandates is being looked at in the General Assembly. But to continue on this presentation, Program planning is allocated to each of the main committees, and in particular, when the Committee for Program and Coordination, CPC, has not managed to reach agreement on program plans for the budget for the coming year, the main committees that are relevant to those particular programs are asked to have a discussion of those programs within their current sessions. Sonia has mentioned e-delegate, and actually my advice to new delegates would be if whatever main committee you are following, if you're not already signed up through your focal points and your permanent missions to those main committees, they give you access to the particular areas of e-delegate. I would say e-delegate is the main way of communication. You will receive regular emails on the work of the main committees. And those e-delegate is a platform that is, you know, by its name, it's particular close to delegates. So you'll get the information that's internal, the draft proposals, messages that are not for general consumption. The other platform that will come up has come up in Sonia's presentation is iGov, iGov.un.org. The information that's presented there for the plenary, for the main committees is for public consumption. And there are parts of the iGov platform on the documents, meetings, proposals, agenda items, the calendar, you have the links for the plenary and each of the main committees on iGov as well. This is just a copy from the resolution that I mentioned about the pattern for rotation of the chairs and officers of the main committees. So just a few slides on the three main committees without going too much into detail. You'll receive the presentation. These links for second committee, you'll get the link to the work program to the different categories of information. The agenda of the assembly was just approved last Friday. So these document symbols They may not yet be available at documents.un.org, but will be issued in the coming day or two. And they are fairly standard document symbols across main committees for the allocation of items, the organization of work. The difference is the C2 or C3 and the symbol. Also, the status of documentation is issued. In the case of the second committee, there will be a secretariat briefing as well as the organizational meeting. There will be a secretariat briefing that will go over a number of logistical and informational matters concerning the work of the main committee. You have there the e-mail contact address. And in addition to iGov, there's also the public website, although I would say that the iGov and eDelegate platforms are the ones that are updated more regularly during the session. Here you have a screenshot with the elected members of the Bureau of the Second Committee. I'll leave that without reading it out. The Second Committee specific items. It fits onto one page, but that's just because the sub-items are not listed here. So, I'll also just leave that with you for circulation. On the Third Committee, likewise, a lot of information can be found on the iGov Third Committee page. The allocation and organization of work documents have those standard symbols and will be available, if not already available at documents.un.org, will be issued in the next day or two. The Third Committee had a specific briefing. Unfortunately, it was already held at 10:00 a.m. this morning. I suggest that if you would have liked to be there but didn't know about it, to contact that e-mail address because I know there were specific information and presentations made this morning that would be relevant for Third Committee delegates. And again, I refer you to the IGOV webpage, but also the e-delegate platform. Here you have the elected officers of the Third Committee, the PR of Australia as chair, and you have the vice chairs and the rapporteur. There's a listing of the items allocated to the Third Committee. On the Sixth Committee, I'm advised that the Sixth Committee uses the public website more, more than iGov, so that's more the reference and the page that will be updated during the session. There's a lot of information there. There is a link here to the six committees organization of work. Again, the briefing, six committee specific briefing was held last Friday, but I suggest that if you missed it, to contact that e-mail address and request any information that was circulated last Friday. I think all committees at this stage are using the e-list of speakers, which you may be familiar with on e-delegate. And the information on the opening of those lists of speakers will be available either through e-delegate announcements, but also in journal announcements for those committees. The sixth committee had opened this morning, and you have the applicable time limits there. This slide gives you the overview of the elected officers of the sixth committee. And here is a listing of the specific items that are allocated to the sixth. In fact, I didn't list them all because the very last ones, 166 to 178, are individual items of intergovernmental organizations that have requested observer status in the General Assembly. Maybe just a few words, Sonia has also spoken about the sort of the last point of the work of the main committees during the main session, their report to the plenary. For at least for the second and third, there's a standard document, I think same for the first and the fourth, that lists all the proposals, all the resolutions adopted, whether they were adopted by a vote, whether there was a document of program budget implications. This is a very helpful tool when it comes to the action in the plenary. And a relatively new introduction is the GA's decision on the so-called one gavel approach when the GA comes to considering main committee reports. It used to be that the plenary would, for every resolution that was adopted without a vote, it would adopt them individually, take action individually, and of course, the votes also repeated. In order to save some time and resources, the GA decided in 79-327, the latest resolution on revitalization, that for all those proposals adopted without a vote, that they could be adopted by one bang of the gavel instead of individually being considered, whereas the votes as before are done both in the main committees and at the Assembly plenary. So I think they are Without going too much into detail, that is what I wanted to present on the last three committees. UNITAR · Moderator · Rabi al-Haddad [2:50:07]: Thank you. Thank you, Sonja. Thank you, Emir, for your valuable contribution. I see we still have five minutes, which is amazing. We have time for questions and answers. So please, when you take the floor, make sure that the microphone is red and lit in front of you. Mention your name and the permanent mission you represent, and the floor is yours. I'm going to take maybe two, three questions, and then we break for lunch. Thank you. Yes, indeed, and Sonia is reminding me that you can reach out directly to them. So I see no one is raising their hands on the floor. Okay, I'm assuming everyone is ready for lunch. We reconvene at 3 o'clock for Rules of Procedure. Thank you.