76th Session of the United Nations General Assembly
UN Security Council Briefings by Chairs of subsidiary bodies of the Security Council
Statement by Ambassador Sven Jürgenson
December 13, New York
Thank you Mr Chair,
I have had the honour to chair the Committee established pursuant to resolution 1518 (2003), concerning Iraq, and the Committee established pursuant to resolution 1591 (2005) concerning the Sudan. I thank the Council for giving me the opportunity to share my observations on that mandate.
I would like to begin with the 1518 Committee on Iraq.
Throughout the last two years as the Chair of the Committee, I have been committed to supporting Iraq in its efforts to recover its assets and achieving progress with regard to the delisting of entities and individuals.
The Committee and the Permanent Mission of Iraq have continued efforts towards the reduction of the number of listed entities, maintaining momentum created during the previous Chair and reducing the number of entities on the Sanctions List by more than 80 percent over the course of the past two years. This has been a remarkable progress. Due to a close cooperation with the Permanent Mission of Iraq, the Committee has delisted 63 entities, with only 13 entities remaining on the sanctions list. In addition, 5 individuals were delisted. I encourage Iraq to continue to submit requests so that the remaining 13 entities and 81 individuals can be delisted as soon as possible.
For the past two years, the issue of recovering Iraqi financial assets abroad has remained as relevant as earlier. I urge all countries where the remaining assets lie, to cooperate with Iraq in recovering them in accordance with relevant resolutions.
I hope that the delisting of the remaining entries will continue and that it will be possible to terminate the sanctions regime in the foreseeable future.
I will now turn to the 1591 Sanctions Committee on Sudan and then end with some general remarks on all of the committees.
Two years ago, my predecessor, Ambassador Wronecka, Permanent Representative of Poland, handed over the Chairmanship of the Committee on Sudan, while emphasising the importance of transparency, fairness and accountability in the work of the Committee. She also pointed out that the Chair has limited autonomy and freedom of action, given that the Committee reaches all of its decisions by consensus. This has continued during my term and in many instances, political divisions inside the Council make it difficult to agree on even minor actions in the Committees. I aimed to build on the great work and lessons learned by the previous Chairs. Let me highlight three aspects, in particular, that I am proud of, and recommendations related.
First, in order to improve transparency and make the Committee’s engagement with the Council more meaningful, I provided more substantive 90-day briefings to the Council. We often made use of the Panel of Expert’s reporting, as it is a valuable resource not only to the Council but also to the larger public. So far, we are the only Sanctions Committee who did more substantive reporting by using the Panel’s reports, but I hope that us paving the way for this practice, will open the doors for others to follow. Therefore, I highly encourage my successor, as well as other Sanctions Committees, to follow suit, as it improves transparency and makes the Committees’ engagement with the Council more meaningful.
In this relation, I would also like to point out that in the Sudan sanctions regime, only the final reports of the Panel of Experts are published. For transparency, the midterm updates should be made available to all as well. Publication of quarterly updates should also be given a due consideration.
Also in relation to transparency, I would like to emphasise the importance of respecting and comprehending the relevant resolutions and the Committees’ rules and procedures. Following consultations and based on creative problem-solving, we respected the regulations by submitting the 90-day report and the Programme of Work of the Panel of Experts in writing when it was impossible to brief the Council due to covid-19 restrictions.
Our second noteworthy contribution to the Committee was to update the current sanctions regime as much as possible. We managed to update the list of sanctioned individuals. I would encourage my successor to continue with updating the sanctions regime, as much as the conditions allow and developments require.
Our third biggest contribution is building trust and cooperation between Sudan and the Sanctions Committee, as a matter of priority. I believe that the sanctions regime will only benefit from a closer cooperation between the Committee and Sudan. Therefore, I highly encourage my successor to build a strong relationship with Sudan as well. One possible avenue to pave that relationship is by organising a Chair’s visit. Unfortunately, I had to postpone my visit to the Sudan twice – first because of the pandemic and secondly because of the developments on the ground. I sincerely hope that the new Chair will be able to visit the country as soon as possible.
As cooperation and sharing information between different subsidiary bodies and other United Nations entities is crucial, I also worked to enhance the contacts with other subsidiary bodies, as well as with the Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Children and Armed Conflict. I would like to recall that the Panel of Experts is mandated by relevant resolutions to assess amongst other things violations of abuses of human rights, including those that involve attacks on the civilian population, sexual- and gender-based violence and violations and abuses against children. This reporting must continue. Therefore, I would like to urge the Committee to continue the practice of cooperation with other subsidiary bodies, as well as with the Special Representative of the Secretary General for children and armed conflict and Special Representative of Secretary General for sexual violence in conflict.
Mr. President,
I would also like to address the misconceptions about the United Nations sanctions. Too often, a narrative is put forward how the sanctions are harming the host population, development and security. In reality, these narratives could not be further from the truth. The arms embargo helps to prevent additional flow of arms into Darfur. At the same time, targeted sanctions aim to sanction individuals, who are spoilers to peace. The sanctions in place serve to help the population.
I wish to thank the Panel of Experts on Sudan who has been instrumental in supporting the Committee. I completely agree with my predecessor that one cannot overestimate the value of the information that all Panels provide to the Committees – information that is often obtained under the most challenging circumstances. Their independence, security and working conditions are of great importance. Member States have to respect the privileges and immunities of experts on mission. In this regard, I have to address the situation regarding the Ombudsperson for the 1267 Committee. The Council needs to strengthen the institution of the Ombudsperson. Estonia is currently working on an initiative to address both matters and we hope to bring about a change to show our full support to both the Panels and the Ombudsperson.
In conclusion, it has been a tremendous honour to serve as the Chair of both Committees. I aimed to facilitate progress where possible, bring the sanctions regimes up to date as much as possible, enhance transparency, build trust and strengthen coordination between stakeholders.
It is unfortunate that my successors at this time have not yet been determined and I hope that in the future, the chairmanship of subsidiary bodies is decided earlier as requested by Note 507. In this regard, I would like to remind all members of the Council their responsibility to make every effort to agree on the appointment at the earliest possibility.
In conclusion, my words of gratitude go to the Security Council Subsidiary Organs Branch and the Secretariat for their invaluable assistance. I would like to assure the next Chairs of the Committees of my full support.
Thank you.