View the draft resolution here (This is an out of date version but may still be helpful for reference.)
USA: This resolution represents direct follow on from 30th CND. We are trying to increase cooperation between relevant UN sections. We have received good feedback, thank you everyone. We have incorporated feedback.
Chair: Comments on title? No. Comments on pre-ambular?
Switzerland: We want to replace CND with ECOSOC because ECOSOC.
Mexico: Comment on procedure, bearing in mind that us have circulated this, can we look at resolution paragraph by paragraph?
USA: When we considered drafting, we intentionally wanting it to come from CND because UNGASS Outcome Document reconfirmed the CND’s role. We would prefer to keep text in brackets and then move trough substantive areas and come back
Chair: Comments on PP.1? No. PP.2? No. PP.3? No. PP.4?
Comments on PP.5
Russia: We believe that principle of common and responsibility is laid down in all political declarations, so here a reference to the General Assembly’s resolution is not appropriate.
Chair: Clarify what you’re talking about.
Russia: PP.5. Please change the beginning of paragraph to ‘Reaffirming that the world drug problem’ and then rest of text unchanged.
South Africa: We need to change ‘demanded’ to ‘demands’.
Mexico: Thank you, that’s what I was going to say.
Chair: Can we approve PP.5? removing ‘Recalling General Assembly resolution 69/201 of 18 December 2014 and all other relevant resolutions in which the Assembly’?
Are there comments on PP.6? No.
PP.7? No
Comments on PP.8
Norway: We have an issue with the term ‘leading’ in this paragraph for the simple reason that having a leading role implies that several bodies have a leading role and we think this is factually incorrect. We would take out the word ‘leading’ and replace with ‘only’.
Russia: The language in this paragraph is from p. 18 of the political declaration and we’d like to have language reflected in documents, not differing. We believe the resolution has to do with mandate of relevant bodies. The main role is of UNODC, we think there should be an additional paragraph to reflect this. Tt’s mentioned elsewhere but we think there should be a separate paragraph. This is on the basis of the Political Declaration of 2009.
Chair: Where do you want the paragraph and how will it read?
Russia: Before paragraph on INCB. It would read as follows, ‘reaffirming support and appreciation for the efforts of the UNODC as the leading entity of the in system for countering the world drug problem’.
Switzerland: We will look at this language, but it also shows that there is some confusion of who is leading. Is it INCB or UNODC? We think it’s important to stress the importance of the INCB. It would be inappropriate for the INCB to coordinate other bodies. The INCB is the ‘independent monitoring body of implementation of international drug control conventions’.
UK: If I’m not wrong, most of these ideas are included in paragraph above. If we keep it, then it should say, ‘addressing and countering’ but I think it is surplus to requirement.
Guatamala: Same point, we have no issue with Russian language but we think the text is requesting more cooperation and is linked to INCB so we like the Swiss proposal.
Iran: No problem with paragraph from Russia. If we refer to UNODC, we need to refer to treaty mandated role of INCB.
Netherlands: Echo of Mexico and UK – no need for extra paragraph on UNODC.
El Salvador: Unnecessary extra paragraph.
Norway: We are happy with Swiss input on INCB and agree that Russia’s paragraph on the UNODC is unnecessary.
Russia: Sorry for speaking once more, we want to respond. Indeed it does mention role of UNODC in other paragraphs but also of INCB and WHO and if we have a separate para for INCB and WHO then we need one also for UNODC. If you prefer, let’s delete all three.
USA: We could delete them but also I think there is a difference between them.
South Africa: I think the comments made by Russia are good simply because, if I read correctly, the other states talk about aspects contained. I think the simple way out is to delete paragraph on INCB and WHO, and leave the paragraph where they’re all addressed.
Cuba: Our delegation supports Russia, it introduces balance, we think it’s balanced to have a paragraph on the role of the CND.
Commission Secretariat: maybe we can delete paragraph before one on INCB.
Nigeria: The two paragraphs is good way to go.
USA: Our hesitancy to move forward is that the paragraph is from the UNGASS so we’re reluctant to change, but good points are made. Can we bracket this now?
Chair: We will bracket this.
Iran: If paragraph related to INCB is going to remain, ‘treaty mandated’ was previously agreed.
Comments on PP.9
Netherlands: Reaffirming instead of recognising.
Switzerland: WHO has role which is different from others. We would add this element on second line, ‘the directing and coordinating authority on international health work and as the’.
Russia: We’d like to clarify source – is this agreed language? We’d like to have ‘treaty-mandated’ role instead of ‘critical and unique’ role.
USA: This is not based on previous conventions, but it is based on previous discussions at various conferences over the last few years – so it is informally agreed on.
Australia: We support the language suggested by Switzerland. We think paragraph is phrased better now.
Iran: To add a phrase – ‘treaty-mandated body’
South Africa: I left the impression that this paragraph is in brackets, can this be discussed with the others all together?
Netherlands: We think we can stop the resolution after ‘increased collaboration and coordination between these two entities’, add in the established area of joint interest.
Mexico: We welcome reference to Memorandum of Understanding, we think this priority is not that clear. We would like to use OP.21 of omnibus resolution which goes into detail on health measures. Of course we could work with colleagues from US. This is agreed language.
Guatamala: We would delete ‘with appreciation’ and say instead ‘the signing of’ because this is more coherent.
Belgium: This is the same concern. We see the value but it can be problematic to single out one area of cooperation. We think you could have proposals suggested by Mexico.
USA: We take point about not wanting to prioritise any efforts but we did want to address issue of rapid growth of NPS, and one area where we could see increased collaboration between WHO and UNODC is to see the speedy scheduling of these drugs. We see this as a great opportunity for collaboration. We’ve seen this referenced in Memorandum, the WHO says that they need additional resources.
Russia: We think this paragraph should be there, we need cooperation to address world drug problem. We agree with previous speakers to affect present stage. It is too early to assign priorities, we are not talking about interests but about their mandates. We propose shortening paragraph and ending it after world drug problem.
South Africa: If it’s like this it’s fine, but maybe if the discussion will continue…
Ecuador: It’s not clear who proposed paragraph but we’re grateful because it’s one of the main values of this resolution. We like ‘welcome with appreciation’. We agree with Mexico over coordination of these under MOU.
UK: This is the kind of cooperation we were looking for at UNGASS. I’d like to say that from our perspective collaboration from UNODC and WHO has moved on a lot, particularly in scheduling, evidenced by signing MOU. I’d like to keep second half of paragraph and bracket it.
Chair: We’ll bracket that too so people can speak to USA about it. Comments on PP.10?
With your agreement let’s move to OP.1.
Russia: I’d like to take us back to preamble. Can the paragraph on ECOSOC and its subsidiary bodies reflect what they are? I can propose language, this resolution establishes one of subsidiary bodies. ‘Recognizing the important role played by the subsidiary bodies of the Commission on Narcotic Drugs, including by serving as platforms for regional coordination mechanisms for national drug law enforcement agencies to study questions related to illicit drug trafficking in the respective regions’ and the rest deleted.
USA: Maybe we can keep it as CND and delete the rest (so it runs like this, ‘Recognizing also the important role played by the subsidiary bodies of the Commission on Narcotic Drugs’)
Ecuador: I don’t think I can accept Russia’s delegation because we’re looking at strengthening coordination, not just the law, there’s WHO and other bodies.
Guatamala: We think that just signing one side won’t be good, but we support US proposal.
Chair: This is ok for everyone.
Comments on OP.1
Ecuador: For OP.1, we’d like to add ‘evidence based’.
Russia: We’d like to add after approach ‘supply and drug reduction strategies’.
Ecuador: We can accept the Russian proposal if after strategies we include, ‘and human rights strategies’.
Russia: Thank you for the addition but now human rights strategies are not included in drug supply and demand reduction so there are two sets of strategies, but in UNGASS doc we talk about human rights as cutting across all strategies. So please remove it.
UK: We have no problem with adding ‘scientific approach’, but if we delete Ecuador’s human rights bit then let’s delete Russia’s demand/supply bit.
Canada: We agree with UK above. Can we make it ‘addressing and countering’ so it is more consistent with UNGASS language?
USA: Let’s keep this paragraph broad because that way we will reach a compromise.
Chair: Can we approve this, ‘1. Recognizes that addressing and countering the world drug problem remains a common and shared responsibility that requires effective and increased international cooperation and demands an integrated, scientific, evidence-based multidisciplinary, mutually reinforcing and balanced approach’? Yes.
Iran: Change ‘urges’ to ‘requests’.
South Africa: We can remove what Guatemala wants, but let’s add criminal before justice.
UK: Change ‘request’ from Iran to ‘encourages’.
Russia: We’d like to see ‘control’ added after drug. I haven’t seen ‘drug issues’ in any of agreed documents.
Ecuador: We would like to put ‘and education’ inserted after ‘health’ in third line, this would be in keeping with paragraph 17 of UNGASS outcome document.
UK: Want to respond to Russia, focus only on drug control issues would be too narrow. It could be ‘drug policy issues’.
France: We agree with UK. This paragraph needs to be as broad as possible.
Norway: We share concerns of UK and support their proposal for amendment.
USA: Can we respond to call for broadness of this paragraph, can we delete ‘national’ and delete the list of sectors. From our perspective, the health and justice sectors are included in ‘relevant sectors’.
Mexico: I think we need to keep ‘national’ and ‘domestic’.
South Africa: We agree with Mexico. We would like to put ‘challenges’ in before ‘best practices’.
Guatamala: We think inclusion of ‘national sectors’ is crucial, like Mexico.
Egypt: We agree that ‘national’ needs to be kept in to avoid ambiguity.
USA: Let’s keep ‘domestic’.
Ecuador: We support US proposal because although we support national authorities, ‘domestic’ sounds better in English.
Mexico: We’d like to see ‘domestic’ in title for consistency.
South Africa: We like the proposal.
Chair: Can we approve this paragraph and move to OP.3? I’d like to comment on title. Can we change it to ‘relevant domestic sectors’?
Russia: We like the adjustment but since we’re back with the title we need to use agreed language. We should have ‘address and counter’ world drug problem for consistency with text.
USA: Let’s also put, ‘including the health, education and criminal justice sectors’ for consistency.
Chair: Can we approve title? Yes. Then to OP. 3
Comments on OP.3
Italy: We notice this paragraph is very similar to paragraph 6 in resolution L.9. So I request we remove it.
USA: We feel this OP is essential to resolution. We understand that the chairs decision in L.9 was meant to achieve a different thing. We feel losing this, we’d lose something essential.
Mexico: We think this one provides follow up to UNGASS whereas the other, L.9, is part of the run=up to 2019.
Chair: Does Italy have comment? Then can we approve OP.3? Yes. Then let’s move to OP.4.
New addition of paragraph proposal
Netherlands: We have a proposal to come after OP.3, before 4. Reads, ‘Request UNODC to periodically brief the Commission on the progress of collaborative work undertaken with the WHO at all levels, the implementation of the MOU in particular, and encourages the UNODC to explore similar cooperation arrangements within the wider UN system.’
USA: I’d like to draw attention to new paragraph 8bis. Perhaps we should merge these two paragraphs?
Chair: Would this be possible?
Spain: On this paragraph, we understand the opportunity to inform of this MOU but if we want to be that inclusive we should think of other orgs apart from WHO, UNAIDS, Human Rights Council. So this paragraph needs the request from UNODC to strengthen cooperation with other UN agencies, for example in the last part of the Netherlands proposal.
Chair: Can US suggest merge?
USA: We appreciate comments. Could merging be as follows, we add the Netherlands proposal onto the end 8bis.?
Chair: Does it work?
Netherlands: I think we’re still missing requesting the UNODC to give updates. We could also take that to OP.8.
Switzerland: We’d like to voice our support for ideas from the Netherlands. We think this is an elegant solution.
USA: Thank you chair. We propose that report form UNODC be broader than just collaborative work with WHO. We propose that it reads, ‘on collaborative work taken across the UN system’ and this placed at the end of paragraph.
Russia: Since this is new language, the Dutch addition was not included in circulated addition. We would like this to be bracketed and to be put in informals for later this afternoon.
Egypt: We agree with Russia.
Spain: We’d like to include the point that cooperation with other UN bodies, where there is overlap or where mandates coincide.
South Africa: In the first line, the word ‘to avail’. Is the intention to support coordination efforts?
USA: These tools are there to assist member states, we do not have to follow these documents but the resolutions are there to assist member states in their own implementation.
Spain: I had said we should include cooperation agreements with other UN agencies. The US delegation will reformulate better than I.
UK: On OP.4, we propose that delete ‘together with the INCB’ in the second line and as the ‘policy making body of the INCB’, delete ‘organs’.
Mexico: Most of what’s in this paragraph is in pre-ambular part, we are not questioning role of UNODC. Has ‘drug control assistance’ been used before? We have some suggestions. UNODC ‘to maintain its leading role by providing relevant information and technical assistance and to increase’. I think we need to reconsider the wording of this paragraph.
Russia: If we are adopting a CND resolution, maybe we should not talk about ourselves in third person? We support inserting ‘leading role’ or ‘principle role’.
Italy: We are unsure of value of this paragraph. Does it repeat itself?
Kuwait: We believe this paragraph is essential so we can’t delete it. Shall we look at this in informals given Mexico’s idea?
USA: Let’s put text in brackets right now. If we can reach agreement on PPs perhaps OP 4, 5, and 6 are redundant.
Ecuador: We have already said that we believe paragraphs 4, 5 and 6 are tackling same issues. We think keep them in PP part of bring them together and keep elements from each one.
South Africa: For us, we understand that OPs are usually an expression of PPs. If the intention is to delete this paragraph then we support it’s deletion in PPs, not OPs.
Norway: Let’s come back to this in informals.
Uraguay: Let’s bring these paragraphs together and move them to informals.
Chair: 4, 5, 6 in brackets and moving to OP.7.
Iran: Adding education in title of resolution, if we add this then we need other inclusions. I need clarification on this addition.
UK: We welcome OP.7. We want to add ‘and requests UNODC to include, within existing reporting obligations, a chapter regarding collaboration and coordination across the UN system on our global efforts to implement UNGASS.’
Cuba: We’d like to ask whether this addition from the UK has financial implications.
South Africa: It is my understanding that we are only calling for the implementation of the UNGASS outcome document. I’d propose that we bracket this.
Netherlands: We want to stick to word ‘informed’, we do not think other commissions need the approval to carry out their own mandate.
Egypt: We would like to share concerns that we pay so much attention to UNGASS given we are still pursuing 2009 declaration. We have concerns that the UK paragraph will put too much pressure on Secretariat, and we would like to hear from Secretariat on imagined costs entailed.
USA: This paragraph was debated at length in November. The UK input was from text discussed in November.
UNODC Chief: We confirm the UK’s suggestion would require additional resources.
Belgium: We support idea from UK.
Switzerland: We think this represents an important idea and we believe it has already been agreed in general assembly. We’d like to keep text as it is.
USA: Special Assembly made this request to UNODC already, so it is perhaps redundant. Maybe we should include something in 8bis. specifying that we want reporting on implementation of UNGASS amongst other reporting.
Uraguay: We will wait to see what US proposes later.
Chair: We are bracketing this. On to OP.8.
Comments on OP.8
Norway: We’d like to add ‘to be placed under international’ and delete ‘for’. We don’t think ‘illuminate’ properly conveys the role of WHO and health bodies. We propose ‘crucial work on’ and delete ‘to’ and ‘illuminate’. We’d like to add, ‘to support member states to identify and remove’ and delete ‘support the removal of’.
Colombia: We’d like to add ‘interventions related to infectious diseases, such as HIV, viral hepatitis and other communicable diseases, overdose prevention and NPS after recovery programmes.
Switzerland: We’d like to support current changes made. We think it better reflects work of WHO. We should not limit work of WHO to areas that are mentioned already but include all aspects that they’re working on. After drug policy add, ‘including prevention and treatment of drug use disorders, the provision of health care for people who use drugs and other measures aimed at minimizing the adverse public health consequences of drug use’.
Australia: We want to mention UNODC and civil society next to INCB, as they also play an important role. We would prefer broader language to capture activities to say member states to ‘ensure the availability’ of internationally controlled medicines.
Spain: I feel we’re adding to many things to this paragraph, we might as well add the WHO founding charter! I don’t think we’re moving forward in the right way.
Egypt: We believe that this is a very prolonged paragraph. We preferred original language. Why specify each area of the WHO? We’d prefer either original language or else bracket this.
Iran: We’d like to add ‘recovery and reintegration programmes to last line’.
Cuba: I believe we should go back to original language but we could include Iran’s addition.
Argentina: We’d prefer to return to original wording which was more all encompassing.
Chair: Shall we put this in brackets?
USA: Are we being too specific here? We agree with bracketing this paragraph. We’d need to consult with health experts in DC to confirm we’re properly describing our situation.
Indonesia: I think this is getting too long. I would like to add, ‘the scientific community, academia and civil society’.
Chair: Let’s move to OP.9.
Comments on OP.9
Egypt: Can we have further clarification on what is meant by regional bodies here?
USA: We are thinking of bodies like the OEA, La Organización de los Estados Americano.
Cuba: Our delegation shares concern with South Africa. When we say take into consideration, we talk about the outcome document of UNGASS. We would prefer to refer to all commitments, just all commitments or a list of all.
Mexico: In UNGASS document, we talk about regional organisations. Can we refer to them as organisations here? Many delegations want explicit reference to UNGASS, we don’t mind referring to ‘progress yet to be made’ in implementation of 2009 plan.
South Africa: Can we add, ‘2009 Political Declaration and Plan of Action, the 2014 Joint Ministerial Statement and’ the outcomes of thirtieth session of General Assembly?
USA: We have no problem with that.
Mexico: We would like to take this paragraph to informals because we’d like more emphasis on UNGASS outcome document.
Chair: We will move to OP.10.
Comments on OP.10
Italy: We think there is duplication with L.5. We would delete this paragraph.
Mexico: In line with our previous statements, it is timely to bring UNGASS to the fore and that it is good to have a resolution regarding it because this is first session since General Assembly.
USA: We can be flexible with regards to this being PP or OP but we do want to keep it in.
Italy: We would go along with Mexican proposal to make this a PP.
Mexico: I am happy for it to be moved to PP. US can decide where.
South Africa: My delegation would like to bracket this paragraph.
Mexico: This paragraph does not refer to inter-sessionals and there are two texts and this refers to recent omnibus in November, and it is agreed language.
Chair: OP.10 bracketed. To move to OP.11.
Comments on OP.11
Iran: We’d like to add ‘relevant’ between ‘all’ and ‘stakeholders’.
Cuba: I don’t think this should be included here to avoid complications.
Egypt: We already have L.10 concerning subsidiary bodies. We should delete this and stick to what was agreed upon in L.10.
USA: This is not duplication of L.10. It is about keeping in mind improvement and effective implementation of UNGASS in subsidiary bodies.
Nigeria: I think we perfectly understand what our colleague from US talks about. We are not saying it should be deleted, but maybe we should copy some of L.10 and take it over to this one, because we do not want to create controversy between this draft and L.10 by making slightly differing points in them.
Cuba: We want to delete it or make it the same as in L.10.
USA: We won’t get information we want at inter-sessional meetings because otherwise local information will not get through and we will not make such informed decisions.
Chair: Let’s look at OP.12.
Comments on OP.12
All agree on OP.12 and we finish reviewing L.8.