The Office of Internal Oversight Services (OIOS) was established by the General Assembly in its resolution 48/218B of 29 July 1994. The Assembly decided to include in the provisional agenda of its fiftieth session an item entitled “Report of the Secretary-General on the activities of the Office of Internal Oversight Services”.
At its fifty-fourth session, the General Assembly, under the item entitled “Review of the implementation of General Assembly resolution 48/218B”, reaffirmed its resolution 48/218B, subject to the provisions of the new resolution (resolution 54/244).
At its fifty-ninth session, the General Assembly, under the item entitled “Review of the implementation of General Assembly resolutions 48/218B & 54/244”, requested the Secretary-General to ensure that annual reports and semi-annual reports submitted by the Office of Internal Oversight Services to the Assembly contained the titles and brief summaries of all other reports of the Office issued during the year and that original versions of the reports of the Office not submitted to the Assembly were, upon request, made available to any Member State; and further decided that reports of the Office should be submitted directly to the General Assembly as submitted by the Office and that the comments of the Secretary-General might be submitted in a separate report (resolution 59/272).
Also at its fifty-ninth session, in June 2005, the General Assembly requested the Secretary-General to entrust the Office with carrying out a review of the management structures of the Department of Peacekeeping Operations, and to report thereon to the Assembly at its sixty-first session (resolution 59/296, sect. IV).
At its sixtieth session, the General Assembly decided to defer to its sixty-first session consideration of the reports of the Office on a study on the availability in local labour markets of the skills for which international recruitment for the General Service category takes place (A/59/388); the global audit of field security management (A/59/702); and the utilization and management of funds approved by the General Assembly in its resolutions 58/295 & 59/276 for strengthening the security and safety of United Nations premises (A/60/291 & Add.1) (decision 60/551 A).
At its resumed sixtieth session in May 2006, the General Assembly requested the Secretary-General to entrust to the Office a management review of the Department of Political Affairs on its ability to carry out the management and direction of special political missions and to submit it to the Assembly at the main part of its sixty-first session (resolution 60/255, sect. I).
At the same session, the General Assembly requested the Secretary-General to entrust the Office with reporting to the Assembly at its sixty-first session on ongoing efforts and measures taken to strengthen its evaluation function (resolution 60/257), A/61/83 & Corr.1.
Also at the same session, the General Assembly looked forward to the results of the independent external evaluation of the audit and oversight system of the United Nations; requested the Secretary-General to entrust the Office to submit a report on the use of the best-value concept in the evaluation and awarding of procurement contracts; requested the Secretary-General to ensure the United Nations funds and programmes and the specialized agencies cooperated with the Office in the preparation of a consolidated report on audits and investigative reviews undertaken of the tsunami relief operation and to entrust the Office to report thereon to the Assembly at its sixty-first session; invited the United Nations Joint Staff Pension Board to request the Office to conduct an audit of the quality, efficiency and effectiveness of services provided to its beneficiaries; requested the Office to submit to the Assembly at its resumed sixtieth session an overview report on its investigations and follow-up conducted in the United Nations Interim Administration Mission in Kosovo; and decided to modify the title of the agenda item to read “Report on the activities of the Office of Internal Oversight Services” (resolution 60/259).
Further at its resumed sixtieth session, in July 2006, the General Assembly decided to defer until its sixty-first session consideration of some of the reports of the Office (decision 60/551 C).
