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Lucia A Keegan  11/08/2006 02:46:46 PM  From  DB/Inbox:  Lucia A Keegan

Cable 
Text:                                                                      
                                                                           
      
UNCLAS    SENSITIVE     PARIS 07127

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

DISSEMINATION: UNESCOX
CHARGE: PROG

APPROVED: AMB:LVOLIVER
DRAFTED: LEGAL:TMPEAY
CLEARED: DCM:AKOSS

VZCZCFRI175
RR RUEHC RUEHGV RUCNDT RUCNMEM
DE RUEHFR #7127/01 3040907
ZNR UUUUU ZZH
R 310907Z OCT 06
FM AMEMBASSY PARIS
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC 2705
RUEHGV/USMISSION GENEVA 2516
INFO RUCNDT/USMISSION USUN NEW YORK 0954
RUCNMEM/EU MEMBER STATES COLLECTIVE

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 02 PARIS 007127 
 
SIPDIS 
 
FROM USMISSION UNESCO PARIS 
 
SENSITIVE 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: UNESCO SCUL UNGA EUN
SUBJECT: EUROPEAN UNION AMBASSADORIAL DELEGATION 
SWITCHING ISSUE AT UNESCO'S 175th EXECUTIVE BOARD (FALL 2006) 
 
¶1.  (U) The question of EU ambassadorial delegation switching - 
which provoked strong, negative reactions at the Spring 2006 
Executive Board session - was followed up with determination by the 
Asia-Pacific (ASPAC) States (led by India and Japan, and joined by 
Afghanistan, China, Indonesia) to have a resolution adopted during 
the just concluded Executive Board session that would call this 
practice into question.  Their resolution proved to be one of the 
more politically sensitive issues that emerged.  The wording of the 
resolution as finally adopted represents a significant improvement 
over the draft text originally proposed by the ASPAC States. 
 
¶2.  (U) Although this matter is not likely to be definitively 
resolved until at least the next (or 176th) session, and perhaps the 
177th session, the US Delegation achieved a short-term victory by 
preventing the Executive Board from giving this practice a hurried, 
expedient endorsement.  Instead, working in tight collaboration with 
the ASPAC and Norwegian delegations (with them in the lead), the 
U.S. succeeded in getting the Executive Board to institute a 
deliberative process by which this unusual practice will be given 
more in-depth consideration.  Our hope is that this consideration 
will entail an assessment of the full range of legal, political, 
governance, and other implications arising from ambassadorial 
delegation switching. 
 
¶3.  (U) Also, importantly, the review process now underway expressly 
contemplates the possibility of an active role for Executive Board 
Member States to consult with the Director-General about whether 
such delegation switching should be considered acceptable UNESCO 
practice.  Further, this process offers a critical opportunity for 
Executive Board Member States to, in effect, override the legal 
opinion of UNESCO's Legal Adviser (Yusuf), who on three occasions 
asserted that he finds nothing in the Executive Board's current 
rules of procedure that prohibits such delegation switching.  To 
make their views known, however, Member States will need to be 
pro-active and present to the Director General their written legal 
and policy views on this matter before the next Executive Board 
meeting (April 10-26, 2007). 
 
¶4.  (SBU) The good news is that the European delegations refrained 
from repeating this objectionable practice during the 175th EB 
session.  They appear a bit shaken by the degree of controversy that 
has been sparked around this issue.  Indeed, mid-way through the 
Board session, the UK Ambassador (Tim Craddock) informed ASPAC 
ambassadors that "perhaps we [the European Ambassadors] had gone too 
far" by engaging in delegation switching.  Craddock went even 
farther (presumably speaking on behalf of his EU colleagues) by 
offering to provide the ASPAC group as well as the Chairman of the 
EB with a "gentleman's agreement" letter that in effect would have 
offered an EU promise to refrain from again engaging in delegation 
switching by Ambassadors or their Charge d'Affaires at Executive 
Board or General Conference meetings.  The ASPAC States responded 
immediately by welcoming the receipt of such a letter.  However, for 
reasons that still remain unclear, two days later the Europeans 
abruptly withdrew their promise to provide such a letter.  The ASPAC 
States reacted to this reversal with considerable pique and with 
reinforced determination to proceed with their resolution. 
 
¶5.  (SBU) Caucusing closely with the US delegation, the ASPAC States 
enthusiastically endorsed the US idea that the resolution should 
expressly provide for referral of this issue to the General 
Conference's Legal Committee.  A revised ASPAC resolution to that 
effect was therefore circulated.  When the matter came before the 
Joint Meeting of the PX and FA Committees, the issue was hotly 
debated, with the ASPAC States (joined by the US) pushing for 
adoption of a resolution that called for a three-step review 
process: (i) a Secretariat paper surveying UN rules and practice 
with respect to delegation switching by ambassadors; (ii) follow-on 
independent consideration by the Legal Committee of this issue; and 
(iii) final consideration within the Executive Board of the 
acceptability of this practice, taking into account the Secretariat 
paper and the findings of the Legal Committee.  The EU States sought 
to have the issue sidelined at the Joint Meeting so it could be 
taken up only at the Plenary session, and France called for a vote 
on having this done. (Comment: The Executive Board usually works by 
consensus; calling for a vote is unusual.)   The EU proposal lost by 
three votes (23 opposed to versus 20 in favor of the European 
proposal).  (Comment: Many of UNESCO's Executive Board members are 
not diplomats and were likely unaware of the stakes involved for the 
broader UN system.)  Norway then offered a compromise resolution 
that differed from the revised ASPAC resolution by eliminating step 
(ii) (i.e., referral to the Legal Committee). To avoid a long 
further debate on the issue, the chairman created a working group of 
the interested States representing all regional groups who met 
separately.  Their mandate: to try to craft a compromise resolution 
drawing from both the revised ASPAC and the Norwegian texts.  The 
result of that effort was the consensus resolution adopted which, in 
relevant part: 
 
¶6.  (U) Requests the Director-General to develop a document for the 
176th session of the Executive Board outlining the present rules, 
regulations, and practices concerning the designation of members to 
delegations to the Executive Board in UNESCO and to similar bodies 
within the UN system generally, and, in that regard, to consult 
Member States of the Executive Board in this process: 
 
¶7.  (U) Decides to have a discussion on how to proceed on this 
issue, based on the document requested above, at the 176th session 
of the Executive Board. 
¶8.  (SBU) During the course of the working group's deliberations, 
some ASPAC States (Japan and India in particular) decided to drop 
the referral to the Legal Committee on the theory that that step 
could still take place later, depending upon how the EB's 
deliberations go at the 176th session.  It turned out that 
Afghanistan had not been alerted to this change of position by its 
other ASPAC co-sponsors and Afghanistan privately objected strongly 
to deletion of an early Legal Committee review.  Though disgruntled, 
Afghanistan did not prevent consensus adoption of the resolution. 
 
¶9. (SBU) We anticipate (and hope) that the ASPAC States will remain 
seized with this issue.  Several, such as Japan and India, shared 
privately with Mission Legal Adviser their firm intention to ask 
their Foreign Ministry's Legal and IO policy offices to submit 
timely written views to the Director General that will oppose any 
UNESCO effort to legitimize the practice of ambassadorial delegation 
switching.  We said we would do likewise.  They also shared that one 
of the key factors motivating ASPAC's resistance to this practice is 
its concern about the potential perverse effects this unusual 
practice could have on their internal regional dynamics insofar as 
"intra-region geographic balance" and intra-regional rotation and 
representation on EB bodies are concerned. 
 
¶10.  (U) In a separate report back to L/UNA and others we will 
comment on our differences with Legal Adviser Yusuf's interpretation 
of Articles 36 and 37 of the GC Rules of Procedure on who has the 
authority to convoke a meeting of the Legal Committee.  OLIVER