Morocco pleads for credible reform of the UN
Regional-Morocco, Politics, 11/1/2002

Morocco said Wednesday it backs efforts made by United Nations Secretary General Kofi Anan to initiate a "strong, credible and efficient" reform of the world body, to the best interest of all member states.

The Moroccan permanent United Nations representative, Mohamed Bennouna, who voiced his country's stance during a General Assembly debate on UN reform, stressed the need to rationalize UN action, optimise its financial resources' allotments, and give the UN's executive branch the necessary tools to better carry out its missions.

"The very survival of the UN depends on the Organization's capacity to reform itself," said Bennouna, for whom "the UN can no longer carry on working according to outdated methods and reflexes inherited from the second half of the last century," stressing the need to free UN budget elaboration from red-tape.

The UN must fulfil a "credible" financing regulatory role in international commerce realms, development financing, environment protection, and in fighting crime and terrorism, he said.

Regarding the UN General Assembly, Bennouna emphasized the necessity to adapt its operating patterns to the substantial increase in member states number, the nature of issues it tackles and to the modern communication and information techniques.

Bennouna voiced Morocco's support to Anan's proposals aiming to modernize the UN Information Department, adding however that developed countries' needs in this regard are different from those of the developing nations.

The delegate pleaded for an "active solidarity" with African countries. Such solidarity must translate into the appointment of a Special Council to the Secretary General, who would coordinate and centralize UN executive action directed towards Africa, "which is currently scattered and fragmented," he said.

The UN action in Human rights needs to be assessed in order to set up mechanisms of control that would be run by the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, he proposed.

"In a troubled world, people turn their eyes towards our organization seeking comfort. We have no right to disappoint them, much less not to respond, in an adequate way, to their expectations," he said.

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