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Lucia A Keegan  12/01/2006 09:38:15 AM  From  DB/Inbox:  Lucia A Keegan

Cable 
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UNCLAS    SENSITIVE     PARIS 07612

SIPDIS
cxparis:
    ACTION: UNESCO
    INFO:   ECON AMBU AMB AMBO DCM SCI POL

DISSEMINATION: UNESCOX
CHARGE: PROG

APPROVED: AMB:LVOLIVER
DRAFTED: LEG:TMPEAY
CLEARED: DCM:ACKOSS

VZCZCFRI455
RR RUEHC RUCNSCO RUCNDT RUEHBS RUEHNE RUEHKO
DE RUEHFR #7612/01 3350517
ZNR UUUUU ZZH
R 010517Z DEC 06
FM AMEMBASSY PARIS
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC 3479
INFO RUCNSCO/UNESCO COLLECTIVE
RUCNDT/USMISSION USUN NEW YORK 1037
RUEHBS/USEU BRUSSELS BE
RUEHNE/AMEMBASSY NEW DELHI 1042
RUEHKO/AMEMBASSY TOKYO 2397

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 02 PARIS 007612 
 
SIPDIS 
 
FROM USMISSION UNESCO PARIS 
 
SENSITIVE 
 
DEPARTMENT FOR IO/FO, IO/UNESCO, L/UNA (SULLIVAN) 
L/EUR (OLSON), USUN (WILLSON) 
 
E.O. 12958:  N/A 
TAGS: SCUL UNESCO KPAO XG
SUBJECT: UNESCO: AMBASSADORIAL DELEGATION SWITCHING: 
REVIEW OF LEGAL, PRACTICE, AND POLICY IMPLICATIONS 
 
REF:  PARIS 07127 
 
¶1. (U) This is an action request.  See paragraph 7. 
 
¶2. (U) Reftel reported on a recent UNESCO Executive Board (EB) 
decision (175th session, fall 2006) with respect to a controversial 
European Union-initiated practice of ambassadorial switching (or 
surrogate representation among ambassadors) during EB committee 
meetings.  Reftel further reported that the U.S., India, Japan and 
several other delegations opposed this action as contravening 
longstanding UNESCO practice that heretofore has limited 
participation in such meetings strictly to representatives from 
States that had been formally elected to serve on those EB 
committees. 
 
¶3. (U) Reftel also reported that our success in having the EB adopt 
a resolution to examine this controversial practice prevented it 
from receiving the hurried and expedient endorsement it might 
otherwise have received, if left to European Union Member States and 
other States that would have gone along unwittingly.  The resolution 
adopted however sets forth a step-by-step procedure that 
contemplates more in-depth consideration of this issue by not only 
the UNESCO Director-General, but also by the members of the 
Executive Board, and potentially by all UNESCO Member States. 
 
¶4. (U) The key operative paragraphs of the resolution provide as 
follows: 
 
(quote) The Executive Board, . . . 
 
Para. 4.  Requests the Director-General to develop a document for 
its 176th session outlining the present rules, regulations, and 
practices concerning the designation of members to delegations to 
the Executive Board of UNESCO and to similar bodies within the 
United Nations system generally, and, in that regard, to consult the 
Members of the Executive Board in this process; 
 
Para. 5. Decides to have a discussion on how to proceed on this 
issue, based on the document requested above, at its 176th session. 
(end quote) 
 
¶5. (U) The review process now underway offers a critical opportunity 
for the United States and other Executive Board Member States to 
examine this practice soberly and with a measure of objectivity. 
U.S. Mission (as well as India and Japan), however, would like to do 
more than examine this practice.  We would like to discredit it and, 
in the process, override the UNESCO Legal Adviser's (LA) overly 
simplistic view that the absence of an EB rule expressly prohibiting 
this practice renders it by default lawful.  However, these 
objectives can only be achieved if serious-minded EB Member States 
like the U.S., Japan, and India actively seek to influence the 
analysis of the D-G's "document" to be presented at the next EB 
meeting (April 10-26, 2007)(see para 3 reftel).  In that regard, we 
believe two statements made by the LA are arguably contradictory and 
thus merit closer examination as part of our overall assessment.  On 
the one hand, he has informed EB members that "proxy representation" 
(i.e., one person representing two or more States) is prohibited 
under UN rules.  On the other, he has opined that what the Europeans 
did at UNESCO did not amount to "proxy representation."  Query: did 
the ambassadorial switching in effect amount to a form of proxy 
representation? 
 
¶6. (U) At the close of the EB session, U.S., Japanese, and Indian 
reps reached an informal gentleman's agreement to request our 
respective capitals and respective delegations to UN agencies to 
contribute to this review by preparing written views and also by 
raising pertinent questions aimed at challenging the admissibility 
of this practice, taking into account the contemporary and 
traditional "rules, regulations, and practices" in place at those UN 
agencies.  Since it is widely acknowledged (including by UNESCO's 
Legal Adviser) that rules and practices can and do vary from one 
international organization to another, the specific issue the 
Mission needs to decide is whether ambassadorial delegation 
switching should be a permitted practice at UNESCO.  The answer to 
that question will be shaped largely by what we learn from our 
respective surveys and analyses.  For this reason, it would be 
useful to also examine the relevant rules, regulations, and 
practices that are recognized at non/non-UN agencies that have 
governing bodies comparable to the EB. 
 
¶7. (U) Action Request.  Mission requests that Department prepare as 
soon as possible a preliminary draft of a paper reflecting USG views 
regarding this practice.   Mission proposes that Department assess 
the unusual practice that certain European ambassadors have recently 
sought to normalize within UNESCO's Executive Board in the light of 
representation rules, regulations, practices, and applicable legal 
norms and principles recognized by comparable governing bodies 
elsewhere within the UN system as well as at other international 
organizations.  On the basis of Department's preliminary paper, 
Mission would then engage in an exchange of views with our Japanese 
and Indian Mission counterparts government's respective preliminary 
views.  Mission would provide feedback to the Department from those 
discussions before the USG paper is finalized.  It would be highly 
desirable if Mission could provide the Department's finished product 
to UNESCO's secretariat not later than January 16, 2007.  Ideally, 
and to have maximum impact, the USG's considered views should be 
submitted to the Secretariat in time to influence its separate 
analysis of this question.  We don't yet have a sense as to when the 
Secretariat's "document" will be completed, but we should assume 
 
SIPDIS 
that it could be ready fairly early in 2007. 
 
¶8. (SBU) Japanese UNESCO delegation's legal adviser (Kawahara) 
informed Mission this week that the Japanese Foreign Ministry and 
Japanese multilateral missions have begun research work to prepare 
for submission of an official GOJ paper. Similarly, we learned from 
our Indian colleague this week that this issue is India's top 
priority of items from the last EB that require follow-up, and that 
the Indian foreign ministry is actively preparing a paper on this 
issue that it intends for public distribution. Both delegations have 
expressed interest in receiving USG views and in collaborating 
further with us on this.  Hence, the follow-up collaboration that we 
anticipated is gaining traction. 
 
¶9. (U) Comment: Mission welcomes Department's reaction to this 
request and to our proposed follow-on collaboration with India and 
Japan.  Within the Executive Board, Afghanistan, India and Japan are 
(correctly) seen as the lead activists on this issue, and the U.S. 
seen as a like-minded but less prominent player.  This is a 
perception and a reality that we wish to encourage, particularly as 
we are mindful of the need to avoid needlessly provoking EU Member 
States over this issue.  Our approach to date has been that this 
issue can be, and deserves to be, addressed dispassionately and on 
its merits, bearing in mind its wider implications for important 
issues of process and principle that affect U.S. interests at 
multilateral international institutions.  End Comment. 
 
¶10. (U) Primary contact person at the Mission will be Legal Adviser 
Michael Peay, and back-up will be DCM Andy Koss. 
Oliver