Secrétaire général adjoint à la communication et à l'information
Déclaration prononcée lors de la clôture du débat général de la 29e session du Comitéde l'information (2 mai 2007)
As delivered
Mr. Chairman,
Distinguished delegates,
Thank you for giving me the floor to address the Committee, as you
conclude your general debate for this 29th session. Please allow me to begin
by thanking all the delegations for their kind words addressed to me, to
my predecessor, Mr. Shashi Tharoor, and to the Department of Public Information
and its staff. I am particularly grateful for the warm and generous welcome
that you have extended to me at the start of my tenure as Under-Secretary-General
for Communications and Public Information.
The many positive comments and encouraging statements that I have heard
from you over the past three days are indeed heartening. You clearly have
confidence in the Department as it strives to tell the UN story
to the peoples of the world.
I would now like to try and respond to some of the specific questions
and comments that have been raised over the course of the Committee’s general
debate. Of course, if, at the conclusion of my remarks, you feel that your
questions and concerns have not been fully addressed, please feel free to
contact me or my staff, and my senior colleagues in the Department at any
time.
As the representative of India eloquently pointed out, "the most important
issue we need to focus on is how to make the work of the DPI as
relevant and accessible as possible to the largest number of users". And
I agree with the delegate of China, who said that DPI is
a "window" on the UN. We must open
that window to the outside world, as widely as possible.
The delegations of China and Bangladesh, among many others, welcomed
the strategic approach that the Department has adopted in its work, the closer
integration of its field offices with Headquarters, and the improvements
in the coordinated delivery of information on priority issues that has been
achieved with the help of the UN Communications
Group. This strategic approach is a way to ensure greater efficiency in DPI,
as the delegate of China noted.
Allow me to make clear to you that the priority themes that I identified
at the beginning of this meeting are "umbrella" themes – themes under which
a wide range of issues can be raised and discussed, including the question
of African development, as the representative of Morocco suggested; these
and the other issues she mentioned will be addressed within our priority
themes.
In the field, the important contribution that UN Information
Centres make in this respect has been highlighted by many, with the distinguished
delegate from Nepal referring to UNICs as
the "lifeline" between the UN system
and the public.
Several delegates have suggested that UNICs should
be provided increased resources, both in terms of funding and posts. Indeed,
the financial constraints facing the Department limit our ability to strengthen
the work of existing Centres, as was mentioned by the representative of Nepal,
or extend coverage to countries not currently included within the scope of
our field offices -- a concern cited by the representative of the Republic
of Korea.
Regarding the establishment of an "enhanced information component in the UNDP office
in Kingston", suggested by the Permanent Representative of Jamaica, the Department
is simply unable at this stage to provide the staff for such an office. However
we will be very happy to work creatively with the Government of Jamaica to
see if we can find a solution to this.
In response to a request from the Representative from Yemen to appoint
a Director of the Centre in Sana’a, allow me to assure you that the Department
is currently working to reinstate this post.
Concerning the establishment of an Information Centre in Luanda --
a request reiterated by the distinguished delegate from Angola and his colleague
from Cape Verde -- I must emphasize that the Department recognizes the importance
of serving the needs of the five lusophone developing countries in Africa.
The financial situation facing the Department, where UNICs are
concerned, has not improved in many years and operating within our existing
resources the funds and posts are simply not available to establish and maintain
such an office. We will however, continue to be guided by the Committee on
Information on this matter.
Several delegations, including Germany, Switzerland and the United
States, have stressed the importance of evaluating the performance of UN Information
Centres, a matter that I shall personally pursue. In this connection, I should
note that the Department is, in fact, planning to conduct a survey later
this year to assess the role of UNICs within UN Country
Teams and to gauge how our UN-system
partners view the activities they undertake and the services they provide.
Of course, the contributions from host governments to the work of UNICs remain
vitally important. I would like to express our special appreciation to those
host governments that provide voluntary contributions to support our work.
Monsieur le Président,
Je prends note des commentaires faits par de nombreuses délégations,
et comprend aujourd’hui Sénégal, Tanzanie, Égypte, Union du Comores et Maroc
concernant les efforts du Département en vue d’améliorer le multilinguisme
sur le site Web, ainsi que de l’importance que vous attachez au Centre des
nouvelles et à la Radio de l’ONU, en particulier. Je voudrais vous assurer
que nous sommes engagés à améliorer davantage encore nos efforts en faveur
de la parité entre toutes les langues officielles sur le Web, et que nous
sommes tout aussi engagés à maintenir la qualité de production et de diffusion
du Centre des nouvelles et de la Radio. Grâce à ces médias – et grrâce également
à la vidéo, bien sûr --, nous continuerons à relater l’information des Nations
Unies non seulement objectivement, de façon précise et équilibrée, mais aussi
de manière concrète et humaine, montrant simplement ainsi comment l’Organisation
rend service aux gens ordinaires dans leur vie de tous les jours.
De délégations ont souligné la nécessité d’utiliser les médias traditionnels
afin de délivrer les messages des Nations Unies au public dans toutes les
régions du monde. Dans nos efforts en vue d’élargir notre portée afin que
davantage de personnes à travers le monde puissent entendre les messages
de l'ONU dans
des langues qu’elles peuvent comprendre, la Section de la Radio du Département
de l’information diffuse des programmes non seulement dans les six langues
officielles, mais aussi dans sept autres langues non officielles, à savoir
le bangla, le français/créole, l’hindi, l’indonésien, le kiswahili, le portugais
et l’urdu.
J’aimerais également souligner que la Bibliothèque et Centre de partage
des connaissances Dag Hammarskjöld s’attache à rendre ses services disponibles
dans toutes les langues officielles grâce, entre autres, à un site Web spécialisé
disponible dans l’ensemble des six langues officielles. En maintenant et
en développant le Système d'information bibliographique de l'ONU Thesaurus,
la Bibliothèque et Centre de partage des connaissances Dag Hammarskjöld (DHLink)
contribue à garantir la recherche multilingue par sujet dans le Système de
diffusion électronique des documents. La Bibliothèque et le Centre de partage
des connaissances Dag Hammarskjöld a également élargi son programme de formation
dans le but d’englober d’autres langues, y compris un programme de formation
sur les ressources du site Web de l'ONU en
espagnol et en français, proposé en coopération avec la Section du site Web
de l'ONU. Des
programmes ciblés et des exposés en espagnol et en russe ont également été
fournis lorsque cela a été nécessaire. En outre, la Bibliothèque et le Centre
de partage des connaissances Dag Hammarskjöld améliore son assistance aux
pays en développement grâce à l’organisation d’ateliers afin d’appuyer le
travail de bibliothèques dépositaires et de Centres d’information des Nations
Unies, tels que le séminaire en espagnol, pour la région hispanophone des
Caraïbes, organisé en février 2007 avec le soutien généreux du Gouvernement
de la République dominicaine.
Mr. Chairman,
The distinguished delegate from the Dominican Republic, on behalf of
the Rio Group, asked about the possibility of providing press releases in
Spanish, and other delegates have made similar points in respect to other
languages. As Member States may recall, when the General Assembly established
the Department of Public Information more than sixty years ago, it decided
that English and French were to be the working languages.
Ever since, we have been provided with sufficient resources in the
biennium budgets to produce our press releases of intergovernmental meetings
in those two working languages.
While the Department appreciates the desire for press releases in other
official languages, without additional resources to enable the Department
to recruit and employ additional staff who can cover the meetings in those
languages, this is a service that we will not be able to provide.
In reply to the question raised by the representative of the Russian
Federation and the delegate of Kazakhstan regarding the possibility of providing
webcasts in the Russian language, we shall consult with our colleagues from
the Departments providing technical and engineering services to determine
what cabling and infrastructure would be required, and what the cost implications
may be.
With reference to the remarks of the distinguished representative of
Kazakhstan, DPI was
privileged to co-chair a meeting on inter-regional dialogue and tolerance
convened by the government of Kazakhstan at the United Nations. And a cover
feature on the environmental problems of the Aral Sea region appeared in
the UN Chronicle and continues
to be cited in classrooms and reference resources.
The representative of the Dominican Republic, on behalf of the Rio
Group, raised a question regarding access to iSeek. I would like to clarify
that iSeek, the Organization's Intranet, is an internal tool which aims to
build a sense of community for staff at UN Headquarters
and in the field. Its goal is to help staff carry out their work more quickly
and efficiently through better access to administrative tools and knowledge
sharing. It is the unique system that management and staff can use to communicate
on a variety of issues of direct concern to staff.
The representative from the Russian Federation and the representative
from Angola touched on the geographic and linguistic diversity within the
Department with the need for Russian mother-tongue speakers in key offices
and more staff from the Portuguese speaking community, respectively. I can
assure all delegations that DPI will
take these concerns, as well as the guidelines outlined by the General Assembly
regarding gender and geographical balance, into account in making its staffing
decisions.
In response to the suggestion by the distinguished delegate from Tunisia
regarding World Information Society Day on 17 May, I would like to assure
you that DPI is
indeed contributing actively to the observance of this important annual event.
We are creating a special web page in the six official languages on the day,
and we will distribute the Secretary-General's message to UNICs for
further dissemination, as well as provide the kind of reports on the Day
on our News Centre site that are often picked up by other media. We are also
hoping to organize participation by selected UNICs in
the special events being held in Geneva and New York -- through webcasting
and the Internet.
Distinguished delegates,
I noted with satisfaction the positive statements from several representatives
on the active cooperation between the Department of Public Information and
the Department of Peacekeeping Operations. This partnership has grown more
productive and effective in recent years. We now jointly run training programmes
for UN peacekeeping mission staff,
we hold regular working level meetings across the departments and we jointly
coordinate strategies to increase awareness of the complexity, cost-effectiveness
and achievements of UN peacekeeping.
One of our chief goals in this endeavour, as the representative of
Croatia and the representative of Bangladesh suggested, is to raise awareness
of the significant contribution to global peace and security made by UN peacekeepers.
The communications strategy implemented by DPI at
Headquarters and with the peace operations has resulted in increased coverage
of peacekeeping in troop-contributing countries.
Most recently, we have encouraged peacekeeping missions to help us
encourage TCC media to run feature stories on individual peacekeepers, in
light of the upcoming International Day of UN Peacekeepers
on 29 May. DPI will
help disseminate these stories globally and will also illustrate some of
these individuals in a DPI-DPKO exhibition
to be held at UN Headquarters.
We are looking at ways to expand these efforts, by focusing on countries
that are new to peacekeeping, and by targeting major troop contributors with
the help of the UN Information
Centres located in those countries.
DPI produces
and disseminates news stories on peacekeepers and peacekeeping, filmed by video
producers on our peacekeeping missions, to hundreds of broadcasters via UN TV's
UNIFEED system. Likewise, text stories are disseminated to the media and other
audiences through the UN News Centre. UN Radio
has also increased its use of programming about, and for, peacekeeping operations,
taking advantage of improvements in electronic transfer of audio files. And
galleries of photographs from peacekeeping missions on are now downloadable
directly from the website.
In terms of crisis communications, an issue raised by the representative
of the Republic of Korea, the Department of Peacekeeping Operations, with
the support of DPI,
has developed a standard operating procedure on crisis communications which
has been issued to all missions. In addition, DPI has
provided guidance and training on crisis communications to leaders of peacekeeping
missions and to their public information staff.
I note with particular interest, however, the representative's concern
with the regional dimensions of crises, and I agree that DPI and DPKO should
continue to take into account the need to gain support within the wider region
where peacekeeping missions operate. We have been making efforts in this
regard, with the assistance of UN Information
Centres located within the regions of key peace operations.
With respect to the points made by the distinguished delegate of Bangladesh
this afternoon, DPI would
be pleased to provide the mission of Bangladesh with a compilation of stories
produced on peacekeeping activities and shown on UNifeed.
On the question related to the criteria for producing radio programmes
in non-official languages, the two Bengali programmes were consolidated into
one for reasons of efficiency. There was considerable overlap between the
two programmes. Feedback from our client stations has indicted that they
are satisfied with the change.
With respect to the point made by the distinguished delegate of Comoros
on Swahili radio programmes, as always, it is a matter of resources. As a
matter of fact, the amount of time devoted to radio programmes in Swahili
exceeds the time of programmes in other non-official languages. Also, UNIC
Nairobi produces daily radio programmes in Swahili, which reaches
9 million listeners.
As regards the point made by the distinguished delegate of Egypt, information
is posted on the UN website as
quickly as possible. Public information materials are sometimes not available
to us in all official languages simultaneously. We have brought this matter
to the attention of the content-producing offices and the office managing
ODS.
In the response to the point raised by the delegate of Libya on the
guided tours offered by DPI,
I would like to point out that our guides do make remarks about the question
of Palestine, particularly during the week in which the International Day
of Solidarity with the Palestinian people falls. The guides are briefed on
a regular basis about developments related to the question of Palestine,
and respond to any questions on this issue from visitors.
Mr. Chairman,
We are grateful for the positive references made by many delegations
to the Reham Al-Farra Memorial Fellowship Programme for journalists from
developing countries. The General Assembly has been generous in providing
resources to this programme. However, even this has to be supplemented by
the willingness of outside institutions to host our participants at no cost
to the UN, and of outside speakers
to address them free of charge. Particularly notable has been the hosting
of the Fellows for a few days each year by the citizens of Rochester in New
York State.
I am pleased to inform the Committee that if all the people we invited
this year are able to attend, we will have succeeded in ensuring that each
Member State eligible for consideration will have participated at least once
There is a good case for expanding the programme, and we shall certainly
endeavour to do what is possible within the budget and the capacities of
the programme.
Regarding the comment by the distinguished delegate from Switzerland
that partnerships between DPI and
civil society entities not be "one off" events, I could not agree more. One
recent instance is our initiative on tuberculosis, which saw one partnership
expand to include the preparation of a critically acclaimed exhibition, a
briefing to affiliated non-governmental organizations, media outreach to
United Nations correspondents and health writers and a cover story for the UN Chronicle.
We thank the representative of Tanzania for her recognition of the
Department’s work in support of NEPAD -- the new partnership for African
Development. We wish to assure her that DPI will
continue its efforts to promote, explain and generate support for NEPAD,
both within Africa and among the donor countries -- its development partners
in both the North and the South.
Among our other existing partnerships, we have one with a major university
through which we have already arranged several video-conferences with global
sites, an exhibition, and a project to promote UN programmes
on campus radio stations.
A number of delegations have referred to DPI's role
in promoting dialogue and understanding. Our "Unlearning Intolerance" seminar
series was instituted less than three years ago, but has already left its
imprint in the civil society and academic worlds, and was the focus of a
recent op-ed piece in a leading daily in Bahrain. The most recent seminar,
on "Cartooning for Peace" has been followed by events on the role and responsibilities
of political cartoonists, in Geneva, Brussels and Moscow.
In the context of next week's thematic General Assembly debate on "Civilisations
and the Challenge for Peace", DPI has
helped set the stage by cooperating in the creation of a globally televised
discussion on inter-faith dialogue which brought together various experts
from around the world and participation at UN Headquarters.
With respect to the points made by the distinguished delegated of Israel
on our Holocaust programmes, DPI intends
to continue the programme on the Holocaust and the UN as
mandated by the General Assembly to the best of our abilities, and within
the limits of our financial resources,
Distinguished delegates,
Many of you have called for the Department to be given the resources
it needs in order to more effectively fulfil its mandates. Your statements
of support are an indication of the value that the Committee accords to the
work that we do, and we are appreciative of your comments.
At the interactive session on Monday, we began with a video presenting
the ways that DPI tells
the UN story. Over the past few
days, many delegations, among them Croatia, Thailand and Romania, have reinforced
the importance of ensuring the UN story
is told through the stories of real people on the ground and the impact the UN has
on their lives on the ground. We agree completely with this assessment, and
whether it is in an exhibit, a radio programme, a documentary or a feature
on the web that we are producing, we strive to put a human face to the work
of the Organization and to show how it is working for ordinary people everywhere
in the world.
Even though the formal debate has now come to a close, our dialogue
with the members of this Committee, through its Bureau, shall continue. I
look forward to the outcome of your deliberations over the coming days and
to the strategic direction and guidance that the Committee will provide through
its recommendations to the General Assembly at its sixty-second session.
Thank you.