Statement under Agenda Item 52: Comprehensive Review of Special Political Missions at the
Fourth Committee of the 71st Session of the UN General Assembly on Friday, 28 October 2016
in Conference Room 4
Mr. Chairman,
Bangladesh aligns itself with the Statement delivered by the Kingdom of Morocco on behalf of
the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) under this agenda item yesterday.
We take note of the Secretary General’s report contained in A/70/330, and thank the Under-
Secretaries General on Political Affairs and Field Support for their informative briefings.
We feel there needs to be some interface between the reports submitted on SPMs to the
Fourth and Fifth Committees in order for allowing Member States to have a full picture, without
necessarily undercutting the respective mandates of the two Committees. The discussions on
the draft Resolution under this Agenda item in the Fourth Committee would have been better
served, provided some reflection in the Secretary General’s report on the resource
requirements for SPMs in the current biennium.
The Security Council’s mandate through its Resolution 2261 (2016) to establish the United
Nations Mission in Colombia comprising unarmed international observers for a 12-month
period would certainly have financial implications that this Committee also requires to be duly
sensitized about.
Bangladesh recognizes the important role SPMs can play in realizing the comprehensive
approach to ‘sustaining peace’ through their differentiated contributions to preventing the
outbreak, recurrence, continuation and relapse into conflicts. The diversity of the mandate,
scope and composition of SPMs allow them some degree of speed and flexibility in responding
to any emerging situation under their purview towards realizing the goal and process conceived
in the notion of ‘sustaining peace’. We see the opportunity for this message to be transmitted
across all SPMs as well as the entire UN system from the Secretary General’s Executive Office,
including through its newly formed analysis and planning capacity for early warning and
understanding of conflicts.
In order for SPMs to optimally leverage their potentials and flexibility, it is critical to ensure
predictable and sustained flow of resources for their effective functioning. We reiterate the call for considering the creation of a special account for SPMs based on assessed contributions from
Member States. We do not see particular merit in the possibility of including SPMs under the
remit of the special account for UN peacekeeping operations in order not to compromise the
integrity of the resources available for these two pillars of the UN’s peace and security
architecture. We take note of the Secretary General’s regret concerning the unfinished agenda
with the financing and backstopping of SPMs during his tenure. We hope that the new
Secretary General’s proposals on adequately financing the peacebuilding components of SPMs,
among others, would eventually help pave the way for further informed dialogue on addressing
the resources requirements of SPMs.
Bangladesh appreciates the initiatives taken by certain SPMs to mainstream the women, peace
and security agenda in their work. In this context, the concrete steps taken by in the context of
the SPMs in the Syrian Arab Republic and Libya deserve to be replicated further.
Bangladesh also acknowledges the evolving work on strengthening SPMs’ further coordination
with the concerned regional and sub-regional organizations. We take note of the interactive
dialogue that took place between Member States and the Secretariat on this particular subject
in May this year, and encourage the continuation of such dialogues on emerging issues of
interest.
In our regional context, it would be remiss on our part not to particularly acknowledge the
important work being done by the SPMs in Afghanistan and Myanmar. We look forward to
opportunities for regular engagement and exchange of views on the work of various SPMs with
the wider membership.
To conclude, we reaffirm the importance of factoring in the work of SPMs across all the main
organs of the Organisation as envisaged by the coordinated approach to ‘sustaining peace’.
I thank you.