Committee on Conferences
The Committee on Conferences was established by the General Assembly on 18 December 1974, pursuant to resolution 3351 (XXIX). On 21 December 1988, by resolution 43/222B, the General Assembly decided to retain the Committee on Conferences as a permanent subsidiary organ. Composed of 21 members with the following geographical distribution: African States (six); Asian States (five); Latin America and Caribbean States (four); Eastern European States (two); and Western European and other States (four); the Committee on Conferences advises the General Assembly on all matters pertaining to the organization of United Nations conferences.
The Committee on Conferences held the organizational session for 2011 on Wednesday, 20 April. The Committee's substantive session will be held from Tuesday, 6 September to Monday, 12 September 2011. The Chair of the Committee is Ms. Woinshet Tadesse (Ethiopia), with Ms. Maria Angela Holzmann (Austria) and Ms. Norfarina Mohd Azmee (Malaysia) as Vice-Chair. Ms. Lorena Giménez-Jiménez (Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela) is the Rapporteur and Ms. Mildred Fernandes is the Secretary of the Committee.
Secretariat of the Committee on Conferences
The Meetings Management Section of the Department for General Assembly and Conference Management, serves as the technical and substantive Secretariat of the Committee on Conferences. It assists the Committee to carry out its mandate contained in paragraph four of General Assembly resolution 43/222B. The staff of the Section draft procedural reports which include the agenda and the report of the Committee, and prepare reports for consideration by the Committee on the utilization of conference servicing resources at New York, Geneva, Vienna, and Nairobi to guide it in its recommendations to the Assembly on the best utilization of those resources. It also compiles statistics and consolidates inputs to give the Committee as complete and accurate a picture as possible of the Department's work programme and capacity. When the General Assembly examines the question of the pattern of conferences, based on the report of the Committee on Conferences, the staff of the Section provide all additional information to assist the Assembly in its deliberations. It also provides support to the Fifth Committee in informal consultations when the draft resolution on pattern of conferences is being discussed.
Secretariat of the Committee on Conferences
Ms. Mildred Fernandes, Meetings Management Chief and Secretary of the Committee,
(+1-212) 963-6540
Ms. Jolanta Banaszek-Pinilla, Meetings Services Assistant,
(+1-212) 963-6533