Calling for creative work
The current president of the Conference on Disarmament (CD) introduced the new representative of Romania to the Conference, Ambassador Maria Ciobanu, who delivered a statement on the work of the CD. The current president, Ambassador Chitsaka Chipaziwa of Zimbabwe, then gave an outline of the CD’s schedule for the rest of the week and next and bid farewell to the Deputy Secretary-General of the CD, Mr. Tim Caughley, who is retiring at the end of this week. Japan's ambassador echoed the president's farewell to Mr. Caughley.
Brief highlights
- Romania expressed support for CD/1840, last year’s proposed programme of work.
- The CD president announced that high-level representatives from Chile, Iran, Italy, and Japan will deliver statements on Tuesday, 3 March.
- Deputy Secretary-General Tim Caughley, in his farewell address, said he hopes he is the gallery when a programme of work is adopted.
Work of the CD
Ambassador Ciobanu of Romania suggested that coming up with creative solutions to the deadlock in the CD is not just a responsibility of the rotating presidents but of the entire membership. She noted that the CD is “very sensitive to international security evolutions and to the political climate between key actors of the global stage,” and expressed regret that these actors did not “take advantage of the new flavour of high level interests shared by many countries last spring.”
CD’s schedule
Ambassador Chitsaka Chipaziwa of Zimbabwe outlined the CD’s schedule for the week, noting that on Thursday afternoon the Conference would meet for an informal debate on agenda item 4, while on Friday, 27 February the informal debate on agenda item 6 will take place in the morning and the informal debate on agenda item 3 in the afternoon. He also noted that on Tuesday, 3 March, the Conference will hear interventions from high-level representatives of Chile, Iran, and Italy in the morning and from Japan in the afternoon. An informal discussion on agenda item 6 will meet after the morning plenary and the informal on agenda item 7 will be postponed until the morning of Thursday, 5 March, after that day’s plenary.
Farewell (and thanks!) to Tim Caughley
Ambassador Chipaziwa then explained that the CD’s Deputy Secretary-General, Tim Caughley, has reached the mandatory retirement age of the UN. After a round of applause, Mr. Caughley expressed disappointment to be leaving at a point when in the margins of the Conference there is an “inclination to perhaps talk less about the phrase ‘programme of work’ and more about the word ‘work’.” He explained,
I sense there is a wish now to lay some real firm foundations for negotiations that will inevitably follow. I don’t mean by commenting on the programme of work to diminish procedural framework in which this conference unnecessarily must operate, but I mention it because one needs to keep the procedure in context, given the very grave, serious and important issues that are on this conferences’ agenda.
Ambassador Sumio Tarui of Japan thanked Mr. Caughley for his efforts and expressed pleasure that he would be staying in Geneva.
Notes from the gallery
The Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom (WILPF) extends our own deepest thanks to Tim Caughley for all his efforts to work with civil society and to promote disarmament. Mr. Caughley spoke at the most recent WILPF Seminar held in Geneva in November 2008. Today, as WILPF’s Secretary General sat in the gallery, thinking about next week’s global commemorations ofInternational Women’s Day, she noted that only nine of CD representatives on the floor were women. Mr. Caughley hopes that he will be in the gallery the day a programme of work is adopted—hopefully, he will also be there the day that women from civil society get to read their own statement to the CD on International Women’s Day.
- Ray Acheson, Reaching Critical Will of WILPF