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Remarks by Jonathan Margolis, United States Department of
State, Head of the United States Delegation to the Organizational
Meeting of the Commission on Sustainable Development, Regarding CSD
Reforms, United Nations, January 27, 2003
Mr. Chairman,
The U.S. offers its
congratulations and a warm
welcome to the new Bureau members of the
Commission
on Sustainable Development. We also congratulate
Morocco as it assumes leadership of the
G77, as well as Greece, as
it takes on the presidency of the
EU. The U.S. looks
forward to collaborating closely with all of you, as well as
other member states and stakeholders from civil society and
the private sector, in helping to guide the Commission's
work.
In leading the
U.S.
delegation to the World Summit on Sustainable Development
(WSSD) in Johannesburg, Secretary of State Colin Powell
stressed that "actions speak louder than words." The WSSD
demonstrated the international community's broad consensus
on the need for an action-oriented agenda. In adopting the
Johannesburg Plan of Implementation (JPOI), nations
called for the UN Commission on Sustainable Development (CSD)
to place greater emphasis on actions that enable
implementation of
Agenda
21 at all levels.
We have a critical and complex
task ahead of us. The CSD has achieved some successes over
the past ten years. However, in order to ensure its
continued relevance, the CSD can and must do more to
facilitate implementation of our sustainable development
objectives. That was the resounding call from states in
Johannesburg. For the United States, the promise of a
reformed, relevant CSD is the perfect example of what we
look for in a reformed and increasingly relevant United
Nations.
Between today and the
Eleventh CSD session, we have 14 weeks. During these
weeks, we must explore how the CSD can evolve into a truly
innovative forum. Our goal is a CSD that better engages the
full stakeholder community to achieve our goals. Given that
we can only meet these goals with the full
participation of all stakeholders, the challenge for the CSD
is to attract more participation from a broader
cross-section of government agencies as well as stronger
participation from non-government actors. We believe civil
society and the private sector will respond, but only if
governments lead by example and take innovative approaches
at the CSD.
We also call on the
participants from civil society and the NGO community to
take this opportunity to reexamine your participation in the
CSD. Send representatives with constructive messages based
on development experience to share ideas and lessons
learned, and to offer new opportunities for positive
collaboration.
Based on our initial
consultations with other governments, non-governmental
organizations, and private sector groups, two things are
clear. First, there is considerable agreement on the need
for the CSD to focus now on implementation.
Second, it is clear that most,
if not all, of us are just beginning to grapple with the
complexities involved in reforming the CSD. In response to
the Secretariat’s open call for input, we prepared some
papers outlining our initial thoughts on the future of the CSD. In an effort to promote further dialogue, we are
pleased to share these with you today. These
papers outline
the types of CSD outcomes we believe are most likely to
promote implementation. They also lay out a menu of
potential processes that this Commission might use to
achieve such outcomes. Additionally, we look forward to the
Secretary-General’s forthcoming thoughts on the topic.
Fourteen weeks is not much time
to come to agreement on an issue as complex and critical as
this. Our mandate is this: focus on implementation. Our
job in the coming weeks is to ensure that the CSD evolves
into the forum for innovation, ideas, and action on
implementation.
We call on our new
Bureau to expedite these efforts. Convene two informal
brainstorming meetings as soon as possible. The first one
should be in early February, the second in March. In the
meantime, we welcome the opportunity to continue consulting
with governments and stakeholders. Thank you.
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