Ministerial Statement adopted by the Twenty-Fourth Annual Meeting
of the Ministers of Foreign Affairs of the Group of 77
New York, 15 September 2000
We, the Ministers of Foreign Affairs of the Group of 77 and China convened at the Twenty-fourth Annual Meeting at United Nations Headquarters in New York on 15 September 2000,
1. Reaffirm the Declaration of the South Summit. We commit ourselves to the speedy and effective implementation of the Havana Programme of Action and Other Decisions of the Summit.
2. Commend the government and people of Cuba for hosting the first ever South Summit, in Havana, 10-14 April 2000. We express our profound gratitude for the excellent arrangements that facilitated the success of the Summit.
3. Deeply commend the inspiring leadership of the Chairman of G-77 in New York and the dedication of the staff of the secretariat in the preparation and organization of the South Summit and commit ourselves to the speedy and effective implementation of the provisions of the Institutional Follow-up of the Programme of Action of the South Summit aiming at upgrading the current structures of the Office of the Chairman of the Group of 77 into a compact Executive Secretariat in New York and urge all members States to generously support the ongoing process by meeting timely their annual financial contributions as agreed in the Havana Programme of Action.
4. Express appreciation of our Heads of State and Government on the efforts of the five Heads of State and Government to facilitate the implementation of the Other Decisions of the Summit.
5 Decide to establish an Ad-hoc open-ended Working Group of the Group of 77 to discuss modalities for the implementation and follow-up of the Havana Programme of Action and Other Decisions. The mandate of the Working Group includes preparation of recommendations on the operationalization of all decisions of the Summit as well as on the proposals contained in the present and final versions of the report of the five Heads of State and Government. We request the Working Group to submit its report to the Chairman of the Group of 77 in New York by February 2001.
6. Welcome the progress achieved at the First Intergovernmental Preparatory Committee for the Third United Nations Conference on the LDCs held in New York 24-28 July 2000. We fully endorse the proposal for convening a meeting of the Preparatory Committee to consider the pending issues in addition to the two sessions initially approved by the General Assembly. We urge the international community to take special initiatives for the LDCs, particularly in regard to the eradication of poverty, equitable implementation of the WTO Agreements, capacity building, free access to their exports in the world markets, debt cancellation, increased ODA and incentives for FDI flows to the LDCs.
7. Reaffirm our commitment to the success of the International Intergovernmental High-Level Event on Financing for Development to be held in 2001. Members of the Group should continue to actively and effectively participate in the proceedings of the Preparatory Committee as well as the regional meetings, and the conference itself with the view to address national, international and systemic issues relating to financing for development in a holistic manner. We also call for the active participation of all stakeholders in the said conference with a view to ensuring enhanced financing for development, as well as to make international financial system development-oriented, including through broad-based participation of developing countries.
8. Emphasize the importance of the five-year review of the Habitat Agenda to be held in June 2001. We will endeavour to enhance coordination among members of the Group with a view to presenting a unified position in the preparatory process and the special session.
9. Stress our commitment to the success of the 2001 Special Session of the General Assembly on the Ten-year review of the implementation of the Programme of Action of the World Summit for Children. The Group should participate fully in the process and Special Session with a view to improving the lives of children in developing countries.
10. Reiterate the importance of the World Conference against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance to be held in South Africa from 31 August to 7 September 2001. We commit ourselves to the success of the preparatory process and the conference, and call on the international community to contribute towards the achievement of the goals of this conference.
11. Express our deep concern on the spread of HIV/AIDS and other contagious diseases all over the world, particularly in developing countries and sub-Saharan Africa. We welcome the adoption of UNGA resolution A/RES/54/283 which calls for special session of the General Assembly to review and address the problems of HIV/AIDS in a comprehensive manner. We call for the holding of the event at appropriate time taking into account the urgency of addressing this problem and the need to ensure effective and full participation by all countries.
12. Express concern on the lack of progress on the implementation of principles and commitments of Rio, particularly in areas such as concessional financial resources and transfer of Environmentally Sound Technologies (ESTs) on concessional terms. We emphasize the need that preparation for Rio +10 should focus on identifying challenges and constraints in meeting such commitments, principles and evolving mechanisms and measures to remedy the situation. We stress that the review of Rio +10 should not lead to renegotiation of Agenda 21 but to the identification of areas where further actions are needed and the source of finance to facilitate their implementation.
13. Call for an intergovernmental process to consider and develop appropriate guidelines and rules of engagement of the private sector with the United Nations system, including the UN Secretary-General's Global Compact Initiative.
14. Reiterate our deep concern over the difficult and chronic financial situation of the United Nations, primarily caused by the failure of a few developed countries, in particular the major contributor, to pay their assessed contributions to the regular budget and peacekeeping budgets in full, on time and without conditions.
15. Reaffirm that the principle of the "capacity to pay" is the fundamental criterion in the apportionment of the expenses of the United Nations, and in this context, stressed that developing countries should not be assessed at a rate higher than their capacity to pay as a result of any adjustments in the scale.
16. Reiterate that the current principles and guidelines for the apportionment of the expenses of peacekeeping operations approved by the General Assembly should constitute the basis for any discussions on the peacekeeping scale.
17. Underscore that resources proposed by the Secretary-General for the budget of the United Nations should be commensurate with all mandates programmes and activities in order to ensure their full implementation.
18. Stress that there should be a balanced allocation of time for all administrative and budgetary issues of the United Nations to be considered during the fifty-fifth session of the General Assembly.
19. Approve the report of the Fifteenth Meeting of the Committee of Experts of the Perez-Guerrero Trust Fund (PGTF) (Doc. G-77/AM(XII)/2000/2), which was presented in accordance with the guidelines for the utilization of PGTF, and endorse its recommendations. We commend the leadership of the Chairman of the Committee of Experts for his continued commitment and express our satisfaction with the results achieved by PGTF.
20. Approve the financial statement of the ECDC Account of the Group of 77 (Doc. G-77/AM(XII)/2000/3) as presented by the Chairman of the Group of 77. We appeal to all members of the Group of 77 to contribute generously to the ECDC Account in accordance with the decision contained in the Havana Programme of Action adopted by the South Summit held in Havana, Cuba, from 10 to 14 April 2000.
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