General Assembly Session 61 meeting 47

The Acting President

Today we are considering several items, including agenda item 42, "Report of the Economic and Social Council"; item 43, Return or restitution of cultural property to the countries of origin"; item 44, "Culture of peace"; item 45, "The role of the United Nations in promoting a new global human order"; and item 49, "Sport for peace and development".

In September 2005, world leaders reaffirmed, in the World Summit Outcome document (resolution 60/1), the Declaration on a Culture of Peace. This year is the sixth year of the International Decade for a Culture of Peace and Non-violence for the Children of the World. We should indeed highlight its objectives and the true meaning of the culture of peace. It is a set of principles and conduct for a way of living designed to renounce violence and prevent the eruption of conflicts. It also focuses on the underlying causes of such conflicts. It attempts to solve problems through dialogue and negotiations between individuals, States and groups.

The agenda for a culture of peace, adopted by the General Assembly in 1999 (resolution 52/243), set out eight strengthening actions relating to the culture of peace: actions to foster a culture of peace through education; to promote sustainable economic and social development; to promote respect for all human rights; to ensure equality between women and men; to foster democratic participation; to advance understanding, tolerance and solidarity; to support participatory communication and the free flow of information and knowledge; and to promote international peace and security.

It was the task of UNESCO -- working together with a number of entities within the United Nations system, Member States and civil society -- to coordinate all of the relevant activities relating to the International Decade for a Culture of Peace. Document A/61/175, which is before the Assembly today, provides a comprehensive picture of all of the important and effective activities envisaged, showing that the United Nations is playing a major and significant role in establishing a new global human order.

I would like to take this opportunity to highlight the importance of initiatives taken to promote dialogue among civilizations, cultures, religions and peoples. This is a way of strengthening rapprochement, tolerance and mutual understanding of values, languages, history and culture. A number of summit conferences have focused on practical and concrete activities to foster such dialogue.

The leaders of the world, in the World Summit Outcome document, also stressed the importance of sports in all forms in strengthening a culture of peace and development. Sports can also help to promote tolerance and mutual understanding. The year 2005 was declared the International Year for Sport and Physical Education, and we stressed the important part played by sports in helping to achieve the Millennium Development Goals and to improve public health. Emphasis was placed on the concept of sports as a world language that could break down barriers, including social, religious and ethnic barriers between peoples and societies and could bring people together, surpassing differences and strengthening communication and understanding. All of this would help to promote lasting peace among peoples.

Today, the world is still faced with conflict, war, violence and diseases. We all have to work together to put an end to these phenomena that hamper sustainable development and peace. The United Nations and the General Assembly play an extremely important role by developing policies and mechanisms to deal with these scourges. I myself believe that sports and propagating a culture of peace are two important elements that will help us to build a world full of tolerance, solidarity, mutual understanding and peace.

The Acting President

I would like to recall that, pursuant to General Assembly resolution 58/316, of 1 July 2004, the Assembly, on the recommendation of the General Committee, decided, at its 2nd plenary meeting, on 13 September 2006, to consider agenda item 42 in its entirety in plenary meeting, on the understanding that the administrative, programme and budgetary aspects should be dealt with by the Fifth Committee.

At the same meeting, the Assembly took note of the clarification that, in implementing resolution 58/316 to consider item 42 in its entirety in plenary meeting, the relevant parts of chapter I of the report that are under agenda items already allocated to the Main Committees will be considered by the Committee concerned for final action by the General Assembly.

Under this item, the Assembly has before it the report of the Economic and Social Council (A/61/3), a report of the Secretary-General (A/61/370), and the report of the Executive Director of the United Nations Population Fund (A/61/273).

I now give the floor to His Excellency Mr. Ali Hachani, President of the Economic and Social Council, to introduce the report of the Council.

Mr. Hachani (Tunisia)

I thank you for this opportunity to introduce the 2006 report of the Economic and Social Council.

Development -- together with peace and security, human rights and strengthening the United Nations -- was a central concern of world Leaders at the 2005 World Summit. They placed the Economic and Social Council at the centre of efforts to monitor and advance implementation of the United Nations Development Agenda, in a unified and coherent way. Thus the common thrust of the Council's session this year was the follow-up to the commitments made at the Summit.

I will briefly highlight some of the key outcomes of the Council's work during the past year and then focus on the future, including the new responsibilities assigned to the Economic and Social Council by the Summit.

This year's special high-level meeting of the Council with the Bretton Woods institutions, the World Trade Organization and the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development helped maintain the momentum of the Summit for accelerating progress towards the agreed development goals. Advancing the realization of the Monterrey Consensus was seen as a critical element to that end. This meeting represents the centrepiece of our dialogue on the global partnership for development. As I proposed at the conclusion of the meeting, I intend to start exploring how to enhance the impact of the dialogue and to initiate consultations with all stakeholders in this regard.

The Economic and Social Council's high-level segment put productive employment and decent work squarely at the forefront of the development agenda. In particular, the ministerial declaration pertaining to employment generation and decent work for all adopted at the end of the segment identifies a number of concrete steps to make the goal of full and productive employment and decent work a central objective of national and international policies.

The need to fulfil this pledge, to which leaders committed at the Summit, cannot be overemphasized. Widening gaps between skilled and unskilled workers, and between the formal and informal economies, have contributed to persistent and deepening inequalities worldwide. The General Assembly may wish to build on the work of the Economic and Social Council on this central issue.

The Council's coordination segment dealt with another aspect of the on-going efforts to push the development agenda forward: how to translate economic growth into effective social development, including the eradication of poverty and hunger. The debate showed that we do not have definite answers. The Council, therefore, asked the United Nations system to continue to study this question. An important feature of the coordination segment was the follow-up event on avian flu, which took place in the presence of a number of high-level representatives from Governments and relevant international and non-governmental organizations. Discussions during this panel demonstrated the importance of the Economic and Social Council's coordinating role and its ability to shape responses to emerging challenges of this nature.

The Council's work on the operational activities for development was of special significance this year. For the first time, the Economic and Social Council launched the triennial review of funding for development cooperation. The debate on the subject highlighted the diverging trends between core and non-core resource flows, the increasing complexity of funding mechanisms and the associated challenges to the financial sustainability of United Nations system's development cooperation efforts. The Council evaluated how far the United Nations development system has gone in implementing the Assembly's guidance during the last Triennial Comprehensive Policy Review. Expectations are high for the 2007 Triennial Comprehensive Policy Review, given the unprecedented focus on the United Nations role in development cooperation and on the need for greater coherence and impact in its work.

During the humanitarian affairs segment, the Council gave guidance on how to reinforce the coordination of the humanitarian activities of the United Nations system and of others. It gave strong support for the humanitarian reform agenda and made several proposals for dividing the work of the Economic and Social Council and the General Assembly on humanitarian policy issues.

The Economic and Social Council is vested with the authority to promote an integrated approach to peace and development. The call to address the root causes of the world's threats and challenges involves unlocking and strengthening the implementation of the United Nations development agenda. Ultimately, development and security can come only from integrated policies that promote poverty eradication, sustainable development and human rights of our societies. The Assembly may want to draw upon the work of the Council in this area, especially for its deliberations on the prevention of armed conflict.

In the general segment, the Council focused on consolidating and coordinating the work of its subsidiary bodies. The Council's role in that sphere is becoming all the more important as we proceed to implement the development agenda. To that end, the Economic and Social Council had invited the functional commissions and other relevant subsidiary bodies to examine their methods of work, and this year several commissions have given renewed attention to their working methods.

Moreover, the agreement to extend the Economic and Social Council's ad hoc advisory groups on Guinea-Bissau and Haiti is a clear recognition of the useful contribution the Council can make by promoting an integrated approach in that area. We now need to ensure that the lessons learned during the Council's experience benefit the future work of the Peacebuilding Commission through continuous engagement between the relevant bodies.

It is also noteworthy that the Council adopted a resolution on promoting youth employment, in which it urges Governments to consider youth employment as integral to their overall strategies for development and collective security, and encouraged mainstreaming youth employment in poverty reduction strategies.

The Council achieved another major breakthrough in crystallizing its own role and the role of the Commission on Science and Technology for Development in the follow-up to the World Summit on the Information Society. Agreement on a clear and well-defined intergovernmental process, including the additional new tasks for the Commission, together with broad multi-stakeholder engagement in the recently launched Global Alliance for Information and Communications Technologies and Development, carry the potential to make a strong and far-reaching contribution to strengthening the United Nations role in this area and putting information and communications technologies in the service of the United Nations development agenda.

The 2005 World Summit placed important responsibilities on the Economic and Social Council for reviewing and monitoring the implementation of the United Nations development agenda. Responding to this call will be an important tenet of the Council's work in the coming years. So, let me share with the Assembly what I personally see as the opportunities that the new functions of the Council offer, especially for the General Assembly. Obviously, the resolution Member States are finalizing will give, I hope, more detailed guidance on how the new mandates of the Economic and Social Council are to be made operational.

First, the annual ministerial-level substantive review provides a new mechanism for the review of progress and for promoting implementation of the outcomes of United Nations conferences and summits, including internationally agreed development goals. In my view, the annual review, owing to its ministerial participation, can identify implementation deficiencies at the global, regional and national levels, as well as their linkages, and help the international community track policies in support of the agreed development goals and to make necessary adjustments. I hope the General Assembly will draw upon the work of the Council in the annual meeting on development that, pursuant to its resolution 60/265, the Assembly must hold during the debate on the follow-up to the Millennium Declaration and the 2005 World Summit Outcome.

Secondly, the high-level biennial Development Cooperation Forum provides a unique opportunity for Member States to keep global development aid cooperation issues high on the international community's agenda. The Forum should have a real impact in promoting international development cooperation and gearing development cooperation to support the achievement of internationally agreed development goals. The Forum brings together all development cooperation partners for a dialogue on key policy issues. Thus it will scale-up actions to perfect the link between normative and operational work of the United Nations, and help translate what we have learned into improved policies, strategy and practice at all levels.

Within the implementation architecture for the development agenda, on the normative side, we have a three-tier structure: the General Assembly; the Economic and Social Council; and the functional commissions, as well as a number of funds and programmes. The World Summit has challenged these bodies to organize their work in order to maximize their individual contributions for the effective realization of the goals set out in the development agenda.

Do the current agendas of both the General Assembly and the Economic and Social Council respond adequately to the priorities set out in the United Nations development agenda? If not, could these bodies' respective work be streamlined to allow the Assembly's Second and Third Committees and the Economic and Social Council to have a substantive discussion on key issues and achieve an integrated overview of them? While the recurrence of certain topics in various intergovernmental forums illustrates their importance and urgency, Member States might, for instance, better utilize the Economic and Social Council for initiating work on certain topics and make the most of the Council's new monitoring and review function in the implementation of certain United Nations legislation. Each body should have maximum value added and approach issues from a unique angle.

In this regard, we are all anticipating, of course, the report of the High-level Panel, which will lead, I hope, to further discussion of ways for increasing coherence in the work of the United Nations in these areas. We have already taken important strides towards a strong and more broadly capable Economic and Social Council. On the basis of the General Assembly's deliberations on the Panel's recommendations, we must also make the United Nations a better tool for development activities on the ground.

Many other outcomes of the Council are of key relevance to the work of the General Assembly, such as on human rights, social development and gender mainstreaming, to mention only a few. Outcomes in these areas, among others, will help the Second and Third Committees in their work.

My experience as President of the Council has shown me the potential of the Economic and Social Council in meeting many of the critical concerns of the international community. The profile, the convening power and the consensus building opportunity that have been the trademark of the United Nations conferences in the last decade and-a-half can be incorporated into the Council. Indeed, the inclusive spirit of United Nations international conferences permeated this year's session of the Council. In particular, the high-level segment showed that the Economic and Social Council can effectively address cross-cutting issues in a comprehensive manner, with the participation of a significant number of ministers and high-level officials carrying diverse portfolios, as well as with the involvement of development partners and organizational decision-makers. The consultative status that the Economic and Social Council offers to the non-governmental organization community in allowing it to contribute to its work is another unique feature of this Charter organ. It is a feature that should, I believe, be strengthened.

Finally, in order to make the Economic and Social Council's old and new functions fully operational, it is important to support them with sufficient funding and to give the Bureau of the Economic and Social Council the means to carry out its duties.

The adoption of the resolution on the follow-up to the development outcome of the Summit was important. Hopefully, the ongoing consultations will be completed soon and lead to the adoption of a resolution on strengthening the Economic and Social Council. These two resolutions will serve as guide-posts in our efforts to accelerate implementation.

I would like to close with the observation that a more substantive and interactive relationship is developing between the General Assembly and the Economic and Social Council. This relationship should help in providing meaningful and practical orientation to the international community in the implementation of the United Nations development agenda. In this process, key new functions given to the Economic and Social Council must play a central role, enabling the Council to serve as the bridge between policymaking and implementation in the area of economic and social development.

Mr. Rosengren (Finland)

I have the honour to speak on behalf of the European Union. the acceding countries Bulgaria and Romania, the candidate countries Turkey and Croatia and the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, the countries of the Stabilization and Association Process and potential candidates Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro, Serbia, as well as Ukraine and the Republic of Moldova, align themselves with this declaration.

The European Union welcomes the opportunity to discuss the report of the Economic and Social Council and the work of the Council during this past year. We would like to express our appreciation to the Bureau of the Council for its leading role in contributing to a successful, substantive session of the Economic and Social Council. We would also like to extend our compliments to the Secretariat.

The 2006 substantive session of the Economic and Social Council in Geneva was productive, and outcomes from the high-level coordination, humanitarian and operational activities segments were all finalized. We would like to thank all member States for their constructive approach that resulted in a timely conclusion of our negotiations.

The theme of this year's high-level segment of the Council was "Creating an environment at the national and international levels conducive to generating full and productive employment and decent work for all, and its impact on sustainable development". It was a major step forward to bring the decent work agenda to a wider United Nations context. The European Union sees the vital importance in including the social dimension of globalization and the fundamental principles and rights to work, employment, social protection and social dialogue in the ministerial declaration.

In the operational activities segment, discussions on the role of operational activities in achieving the Millennium Development Goals provided valuable insights for further elaboration. The EU regards the debate and deliberations on the progress made in implementing General Assembly resolution 59/250, on the triennial comprehensive policy review, as a very good and sound basis for the preparations for the next review, in 2007. The EU remains committed to being a constructive partner during that preparation process.

Strengthening the coordination of United Nations humanitarian assistance at all levels was the crucial theme of the humanitarian affairs segment. In that regard, the EU looks forward to further strengthening the United Nations humanitarian system and sees the cluster leadership approach, inter alia, as a useful way to strengthen humanitarian coordination. The traditional transition event, organized in Geneva, also provided valuable input for our joint work on the transition from relief to development. In addition, the panel discussions on gender-based violence and chronically underfunded emergencies provided a good basis for further discussions on both of those important topics.

In the general segment of the substantive session, more than 40 resolutions were adopted. However, work remains to be done. In that regard, the EU is looking forward to a constructive resumed session of the Economic and Social Council and hopes that all outstanding issues can be resolved in a timely manner.

With regard to the 2006 Special High-level Meeting of the Economic and Social Council with the Bretton Woods institutions, the World Trade Organization and the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development, the EU acknowledges the continued work aimed at coherence, coordination and cooperation in the implementation of the Monterrey Consensus and the 2005 World Summit Outcome (resolution 60/1).

The EU attaches great importance to strengthening and revitalizing the Economic and Social Council along the lines set out in the World Summit Outcome Document. We hope that the negotiations on the draft resolution on reform of the Economic and Social Council will gain new momentum so that the Council can continue its work with reform functions at its next substantive session. We encourage the co-Chairs to continue to provide leadership for our work in fully implementing the mandate given by the Summit.

Mr. Hannesson (Iceland)

I would like to begin by thanking my dear friend and colleague Ambassador Ali Hachani, President of the Council, for introducing the 2006 report of the Council (A/61/3), which provides a very good overview of its work.

I would first like to highlight a few issues that emerged from this year's substantive session of the Economic and Social Council. The theme for this year's high-level segment was well chosen. Decent work for all is a key tool for harnessing the energy of individuals in the fight against poverty and threats to our security. A decent job constitutes a stake in society and therefore a contribution to stability; sustainability follows. We are therefore of the view that an employment strategy should be a fundamental component of any development strategy. In the outcome of the segment, the ministers and heads of delegations highlighted the importance of harnessing that societal energy. They recognized the important role of the International Labour Organization (ILO) to that end as well as the importance of ratification and implementation of the ILO conventions.

In that context, I would like to draw the special attention of members to the importance of promoting gender equality. By empowering women and ensuring equal opportunity, countries can achieve great gains in both economic and social terms. However, there is a long way to go. Women are still much more likely than men to be poor, malnourished and illiterate. They usually have less access than men to employment, and they are far less likely than men to be politically active. Women's empowerment should be at the centre of any employment strategy. Ensuring gender equality is vital to sustainable development and the realization of the Millennium Development Goals.

During the operational activities segment, the Economic and Social Council launched the triennial review of funding for development cooperation. The substantive resolution adopted by the Council on operational activities shows its determination to perform its role by providing detailed guidance to the United Nations development system in order to improve its functions at the country level, as well as guidance to the Secretariat in order to strengthen its assessment and analytical work.

Let me now turn briefly to the coordination segment, which dealt with another central issue in the ongoing efforts to implement the development agenda: how to translate economic growth into effective social development, including the eradication of poverty and hunger. During the deliberations, it became clear that we do not have definite answers in that regard. The Council asked the United Nations system to continue to study that question.

Of all the issues covered by the general segment, I would like to highlight only the decisions dealing with the Ad Hoc Advisory Groups on countries emerging from conflict, with respect to which we have once again established the primary importance of the Economic and Social Council in the area of long-term sustainable development in post-conflict situations. The continuation of the Groups on Haiti and Guinea-Bissau is an indication of that importance.

We can be fairly satisfied with the overall outcome of this year's substantive session.

I would now like to turn briefly to the future role of the Economic and Social Council, which is facing new challenges in the light of its new functions mandated by the Summit. It is now more important than ever that we avoid the overlapping and duplication of work. The new annual ministerial review of the Economic and Social Council and the annual meeting of the General Assembly mandated by paragraph 56 of the development follow-up resolution (60/265) should, for example, build on each other's outcomes rather than duplicating what the other is doing. The Economic and Social Council should closely follow the work of the Peacebuilding Commission and prepare a long-term foundation for the economies concerned rather than waste its energy on duplicating the Commission's efforts.

Another new challenge for the Economic and Social Council will be the outcome of the Secretary-General's High-level Panel on system-wide coherence. Coordination remains central to the Council's functions, and I am sure that the outcome of the Panel will strengthen the work of the Council in that area.

As I have had the honour to serve as Vice-President of the Council this year, the Economic and Social Council has become closer to my heart. I would therefore like to express my deep concern at the lack of progress in the negotiations on strengthening the Economic and Social Council. If we are to have a meaningful Council session next year, we all have to show flexibility and arrive at compromises very soon.

Mr. Chulkov (Russia)

First of all, on behalf of the Russian delegation, I would like to extend our thanks to the President of the Economic and Social Council, Mr. Hachani, for the detailed information he gave us on the very useful and important work done by the Council at its last session under his extremely able guidance.

The Russian Federation offers a positive assessment of the work done by the Economic and Social Council this year. In concluding the annual session, its member States expressed full support for the Council as the principal coordinating body of the United Nations in the social and economic areas. They also confirmed the principles of a comprehensive and coordinated implementation of decisions taken by major conferences and summits, and recognized the need to improve the interaction between the Council and the functional commissions, in addition to ensuring greater interaction among the functional and regional commissions.

We regard as fully successful the outcome of the substantive session of the Council, focusing organizations in the United Nations system on constructive work to actually implement the decisions taken at the 2005 World Summit in respect of a major reform of the United Nations system. It was important that the Economic and Social Council's crucial role was proclaimed decisive in ensuring political and policy guidance for all activities in this area. A very solid package of decisions was taken by the Council in determining the basic parameters for international cooperation in support of sustainable growth and development of all countries in the world today, as well as for the promotion of the maximum development of the potential of the social and economic sector in the United Nations system.

We stress the importance of the ministerial declaration adopted by the Economic and Social Council, which even more clearly sets forth the guidelines for future activities in the United Nations system in the area of strengthening the foundations for sustainable development at the national and international levels. We believe that that document, and indeed the entire course of the very interesting and substantive discussion at the high-level segment, actually do correctly reflect the level of consensus reached on matters relating to employment and the rights of workers as it exists today among the various countries. We also welcome the outcome of work of the segment on operational activities.

It was fundamentally important that the Economic and Social Council confirmed the current three-tiered structure for operational activities with a clear division of labour between the General Assembly, which sets forth a political guideline, and the Economic and Social Council, which turns those policy guidelines into actual decisions for the operational agencies to implement. We believe that the main conclusions of the operational segment were the decisions on the priorities for the sixty-second session of the General Assembly in respect of the triennial review of the operational activities of the United Nations for development, confirming the decisive role played by Assembly resolutions on all matters relating to operational activities.

Russia is an active member of two regional economic commissions -- the Economic Commission for Europe (ECE) and the Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP). We are pleased that the Economic and Social Council confirmed the key role played by regional commissions in developing a balanced global policy on trade, economic and financial issues, and also in coordinating and assessing implementation of decisions at major conferences and summits at the regional level.

We were pleased that a positive assessment was offered of the reform of the ECE. We believe that the forum made it possible to further improve the management structure of the Commission, to strengthen its accountability and transparency and to restructure its programme of work, so that it is now based on the priorities of ECE member States and takes account of the new political and economic realities in Europe.

We greatly appreciate the work done by ESCAP, inter alia, in developing a transport network and in dealing with issues relating to energy security and information technology. This work is proceeding along the lines of Russian proposals to establish a new transport, energy and information communications infrastructure in Asia and the Pacific.

The Russian Federation advocates the further strengthening of cooperation between the Economic and Social Council and the international financial and trade institutions. The meeting at the high-level segment with the heads of those institutions confirmed the growing authority of the Economic and Social Council as a forum for global dialogue and interaction among partners with all interested players, so as to discuss emerging global tendencies and policies and to react effectively to events that take place in the international arena in the economic, environmental and social areas.

The practice of holding an annual high-level meeting of the Economic and Social Council with the Bretton Woods institutions, the World Trade Organization and the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development is also valuable and we believe this practice should be continued, taking into account the powers, mandates and decision-making modalities of the institutions involved. We believe that the next such meeting will be a major milestone in preparing for a regular high-level dialogue on financing for development, both here in the General Assembly and, subsequently, at the upcoming international conference on reviewing the implementation of decisions taken at Monterrey.

In conclusion, I would like to make the following point: the 2005 World Summit gave a clear mandate regarding measures to be taken to strengthen the Economic and Social Council. We think that the draft resolution, as it stands now, is a very appropriate response to the instruction given us by the leaders of the Member States of the United Nations. We believe that work on it should be completed as soon as possible, particularly because the delegations during consultations have already been able to move significantly forward towards a common understanding of the fundamentally important elements therein. We hope that a consensus version of the draft will be available shortly, establishing sensible and pragmatic parameters for the work of the Economic and Social Council.

Mr. Rachkov (Belarus)

The delegation of the Republic of Belarus studied with interest the report on the work of the Economic and Social Council. We would like to extend our thanks to Ambassador Ali Hachani for introducing it to us.

This year was very special because it began the period of implementing agreements on supporting developments throughout the world and following up on decisions taken at the 2005 World Summit at the United Nations. If we really want to speed up the implementation of the Millennium Development Goals, then it is clear that we must strengthen the coordinating mechanisms of the United Nations. In particular, we must strengthen the capacity of the Economic and Social Council. It is for that reason that, in the past year, we have attached such importance to making progress in the negotiations to reform the Council.

We continue to believe that the purpose of reform must be to assist the Council in playing its primary role of making development a success instead of a problem. To that end, we must direct the full potential of United Nations agencies and bodies in the economic and social area towards providing practical support to Governments most in need of assistance in achieving their national development strategies. The Economic and Social Council must become an international forum for important international decisions in support of development. That should be the goal of the negotiations under way on reforming the Council.

Belarus hopes to become a member of the Economic and Social Council and we are ready to work hard to help it to achieve those goals. We trust that our determination will have the support of Member States and that they will support our candidacy in November's elections.

We feel quite optimistic about the Council's stepped up activity in 2006. We welcome the Bureau's decision to prepare key resolutions in New York for adoption at Geneva during the Council's substantive session. I believe that the preparatory work contributed to the adoption of well-considered and balanced decisions at Geneva. We do not agree with delegations that have expressed the view in consultations on Council reform that there is duplication in the work of the substantive sessions of the Economic and Social Council with that of the General Assembly's Second and Third Committees. The General Assembly adopts policy decisions as regards multifaceted international processes, for which prior work is often needed in the context of more specialized bodies that have a smaller membership. Complementarity between the work of the Economic and Social Council and the General Assembly will lead to better coordination in the activities of United Nations bodies.

Based on Economic and Social Council resolution 2006/27, a meeting of the funds and programmes of the United Nations and other international organizations was held in Tokyo in September 2006 with a view to strengthening cooperation in the area of combating human trafficking. The conclusions and recommendations emanating from that meeting were part of the recent draft resolution introduced by Belarus and adopted in the Third Committee regarding improving the coordination of efforts to combat trafficking in persons. We believe that the ideas in Council resolution 2006/24 on international cooperation in the fight against corruption and in Council resolution 2006/5 on strengthening of the coordination of emergency humanitarian assistance of the United Nations will be helpful in preparing draft resolutions to be adopted on these topics at this session of the General Assembly.

The Economic and Social Council must play a key role in preparing the triennial comprehensive review of operational activities for development during the sixty-second session of the General Assembly.

The Council plays an irreplaceable role in evaluating the report of the High-level Panel on United Nations System-wide Coherence in the Areas of Development, Humanitarian Assistance and the Environment. Conclusions and proposals of the Council on those issues will constitute a real contribution by the Council to the reform and renewal of the activities of the entire United Nations in the social, economic, environmental and humanitarian spheres.

We welcome the measures taken by the Council to promote the United Nations system-wide reform process. In that regard, an important step was the Council's approval of the workplan to reform the Economic Commission for Europe (ECE) and the revised terms of reference of the Commission. We believe that the implementation of those decisions will help the ECE to take its work to a qualitatively higher level and to adapt it to changes that have taken place in recent years in the Central and Eastern European regions. Implementation will also help the Commission to focus international assistance on European countries most in need.

We should also not forget the work done by the Economic and Social Council on the review of the Commission on Science and Technology for Development and the follow-up to the World Summit on the Information Society.

The foregoing constitutes the contributions of the Economic and Social Council to the work we are doing together. They provide us an opportunity to realize the importance of the efforts of the Economic and Social Council to our collective decisions to address acute international issues in the social, economic, environmental and humanitarian fields. Our task here is to establish the requisite working conditions to enable the Council to work well and play its complex coordinating and organizational role. Belarus has always believed that the Economic and Social Council should not just be a sort of testing ground for saving money. We believe that the support provided to the Council must be commensurate with its role and the tasks allocated to it. If we do that, we shall all benefit.