MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Falklands at C 24 June 20; UN Committee supports sending missions to Non-self Governing Territories

Morejón, C 24 chair said that visiting missions were critical “in hearing the concerns of the people of the non self governing territories”

The United Nations Special Committee on Decolonization, or C 24, will be hearing the Falklands/Malvinas question in a week’s time, Thursday June 20, after having heard those relative to Gibraltar and Western Sahara on Wednesday 12 June.

C 24 also underlined the importance of sending special missions to the Territories to collect data to help advance with the decolonization mandate as well as the dissemination of information mindful of world public opinion in effectively assisting those territories in achieving self-determination.

To that effect the Committee reported that this week three draft resolutions were approved on information aspects related to the Non-Self Governing Territories, including the need to dispatch periodic missions to those territories to facilitate the full, speedy and effective furtherance of the decolonization mandate.

Specifically on sending visiting and special missions to the Territories, “the General Assembly would stress the need to dispatch periodic missions to facilitate the full, speedy and effective implementation of the Declaration. It would also call upon administering Powers that had not yet done so to facilitate United Nations visiting missions to the Territories. The Assembly would also request the administering Powers to cooperate fully with the Special Committee in exploring the possibility of undertaking visiting or special missions in furtherance of the decolonization mandate”.

Likewise and in support of this initiative, Ambassador Diego Morejón (from Ecuador) and chair of the Special Committee said that “visiting missions were critical not only in terms of hearing the concerns of the people in Non-Self-Governing Territories, but also in terms of arriving at informed conclusions through the collection of data”.

Regarding information on decolonization “the General Assembly would reiterate the importance of disseminating information as an instrument for furthering the aims of the decolonization Declaration, and remain mindful of the role of world public opinion in effectively assisting the peoples of the Non-Self-Governing Territories to achieve self-determination”.

Likewise the draft on information from Non-Self-Governing Territories would have the General Assembly stress “the importance of timely transmission by the administering Powers of adequate information, particularly in relation to the Secretariat’s preparation of working papers on the Territories”, points out the report.

Finally the representative of Papua New Guinea urged all concerned parties, particularly administering Powers to continue to disclose relevant information, including integrated data on the social and economic conditions of Non-Self-Governing Territories, and to support further strengthening measures to address outstanding issues in a timely manner.

As for sending missions to Non-Self-Governing Territories, “it was a vital means to establish and ascertain evolving issues”.

Participating as observers during the meeting were representatives of Argentina, Brazil, Costa Rica, Cyprus, Dominican Republic, Ghana, Guatemala, Mauritania, Mexico, Namibia, Spain, Turkey and the United Arab Emirates.