Sixth Committee (Legal) — 70th session
Observer status for the Community of Democracies in the General Assembly (Agenda item 170)
- Item proposed by El Salvador ()
Summary of work
Background (source: and )
By the letter dated 10 July 2015 () addressed to the Secretary-General, the Permanent Representative of El Salvador to the United Nations requested the inclusion of this item in the provisional agenda of the seventieth session.
Consideration at the seventieth session
The Sixth Committee considered the item at its 11th and 24th meetings on 19 October and 10 November 2015 (see and ).
At the 11th meeting, on 19 October, the representative of El Salvador, on behalf of Canada, Chile, El Salvador, Estonia, Finland, Hungary, India, Mali, Mongolia, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, the Republic of Korea, Romania, Sweden and Uruguay, introduced a draft resolution entitled “Observer status for the Community of Democracies in the General Assembly” (). Subsequently, Denmark and Luxembourg joined in sponsoring the draft resolution.
Statements were made by the representatives of Cuba, Nicaragua, Bolivia (Plurinational State of), Romania, Venezuela (Bolivarian Republic of), Ecuador, Norway, Sweden, Chile, the Syrian Arab Republic, the Netherlands, Belarus, China, Singapore and Cabo Verde.
Some delegations expressed their support for the granting of observer status to the Community. It was stated that the Community had direct relevance for and supported the three founding pillars of the United Nations, namely peace and security, human rights and development. It was emphasized that the Community was fully intergovernmental and met the established criteria and that the Community respected a variety of forms of democracy. It was also stated that there was no requirement in decision 49/426 to provide the constitutive instrument of the organization in order to seek observer status.
Some other delegations opposed the granting of observer status to the Community. They emphasized that it was not possible to determine if the criteria for obtaining observer status had been met without access to the constitutive instrument of the requesting organization; it was not clear whether the composition of the organization was purely intergovernmental therefore. It was indicated that the Community included membership for non-State actors, and therefore was not purely intergovernmental. A point was made that the treatment of Taiwan by the Community did not correspond to the relevant General Assembly resolution and the Charter of the United Nations. In addition, it was stated it would not be possible to grant observer status to an organization that sought to impose one model of democracy upon States, an action that violated international law and the Charter of the United Nations.
Readiness to working with delegations in order to obtain the constitutive instrument and to verify the legal nature of the Community was expressed.
Action taken by the Sixth Committee
At its 24th meeting, on 10 November, the Vice-Chair of the Committee announced that the Bureau had been informed by the delegation of El Salvador (also on behalf of co-sponsors) that, following consultations with interested delegations, the sponsors had proposed to defer a decision on the request for observer status for the Community of Democracies in the General Assembly to the seventy-first session of the Assembly.
At the same meeting, the Committee adopted, without a vote, a draft decision under which the General Assembly would decide to defer a decision on the request for observer status for the Community of Democracies in the General Assembly to the seventy-first session of the Assembly.
Subsequent action taken by the General Assembly
- Report of the Sixth Committee:
- GA decision: 70/525 [for the text of the decision, see the Sixth Committee's report to the General Assembly]
This agenda item will be considered at the seventy-first session (2016).
