Remarks by H.E. Mr. Abdulla Shahid, President of the 76th session of the United Nations General Assembly

9 June 2022

 

Excellencies,

Colleagues,

It is my honor to welcome you all to this training session on accessibility and sensitivity awareness.

My office is pleased to partner with the Department of General Assembly and Conference Management in convening this valuable session.

With an estimated one billion persons around the world having a disability, including one in every ten children, the conversation around disabilities and accessibility is one that should be occurring more frequently.

No one can enjoy a human right that they cannot access.

And persons with disabilities face many such barriers including institutional, physical, informational, attitudinal and cultural, that hinder full and equal access to their enjoyment of human rights and full social inclusion.

This is all the more important in light of COVID-19, which as we all know added additional layers of complexities onto those who struggled with accessibility.

It is important that the practice of improving accessibility be applied to both physical and online spaces.

I am encouraged by continued efforts at the United Nations, including ongoing dialogues with stakeholders; initiatives like the Steering Committee on Accessibility (SCA); system-wide policies such as the United Nations Disability Inclusion Strategy; and infrastructural upgrades, such as the Accessibility Gate, which together illustrate the commitment of the United Nations to ensuring that the needs of all are met.

For my part, in April, I hosted the eighth Holhuashi Dialogue on the topic of Accessibility of the United Nations Headquarters. During our discussion, it was observed that awareness and training for delegates and staff is a key component of addressing issues relating to accessibility and disabilities.

I am pleased that there will be an informal briefing by the United Nations Secretariat on ‘lessons learned from the COVID-19 pandemic’ and on the progress made to improve the accessibility of the UNHQ premises for persons with disabilities, scheduled for Tuesday, 14 June 2022. It helps to have the many facets of this issue examined by stakeholders on a regular basis.

Today’s event is another opportunity to contribute towards an inclusive working environment for all. We will hear from Disability Awareness, Accessibility and Inclusion experts on matters such as reasonable accommodation, inclusive presentations, disability etiquette, physical and digital barriers.

I thank Dr. Elizabeth Lockwood of CBM Global Disability Inclusion, Dr. Mohammed Ali Loutfy of Global Initiative on Inclusive ICTs and Bethany Brown of International Disability Alliance for being here today to guide us in this training.

Let us use today’s session, which is on the cusp of the 15th Conference of States Parties to the Convention on the rights of Persons with Disabilities, to reflect on the efforts being made and the commitments needed in order to not to leave anyone behind, especially here at the heart of multilateralism.

Thank you.