(Check against delivery)
Statement by Mr. Sho Ono
Counsellor, Permanent Mission of Japan to the United Nations
Fifth Committee
Main part of the Sixty-Ninth Session
Of the United Nations General Assembly
29 December 2014
Mr. Chairman,
First and foremost, at the conclusion of the main session, I would like to express my congratulations for the work we have achieved during this session. We had many agenda items in front of us and had to go through difficult negotiations, but in the end we finally managed to reach an agreement by consensus.
My delegation has a few observations on the work of this session. First, this session reminded us of the importance observing the established principle of agreeing on resolutions with financial implications by consensus in accordance with General Assembly resolution 41/213. My delegation reiterated this important commitment by this Committee on the closing day of the last second resumed session as well as on the beginning day of this session. To my delegation’s regret, little heed was paid to this call. In particular, the submission of the L documents on the outline resolution and the first performance report resolution was unprecedented within the recent history of this Committee. Although this is the fourth time that my delegation has drawn attention to this critical principle at the formal meetings of this Committee this year, my delegation would once again like to urge all the other delegations to commit to this principle and never revert to any other measure which is against it.
Second, in terms of the closing date of the main session, this session ended even later than last year. My delegation, however, is of the view that we could have done better than we did. The late issuance of documents comprises one of the root causes, which the Member States have already agreed to reform under an agenda item of the Pattern of Conference. Nonetheless, we have other structural issues to tackle, regarding which my delegation still has many questions. For example, was the timing to convene Ambassador-level meeting appropriate? At which date should we set the real and credible deadline of sessions? Are there more structural solutions to coordinate our methods of negotiation, which would ensure predictability while preserving transparency? How can we as a committee which calls for the efficiency of the organization efficiently spend our time reaching a consensus? Before the next session, all of us could reflect on these questions and come back with some concrete ideas at the next session.
Finally, I would like to thank the Chair, the other bureau members, and the representatives of the Secretariat, including the interpreters and other staff, for their hard work as well as their patience working this late into the year. My delegation wishes that we may all have a peaceful new year.
