Special Representative

 

 

 

To:

 

PA President

 

and

 

PA Secretary General

 

 

Permanent Council Brief Week 19, 2006

 

This week, meetings of the Permanent Council, the Advisory Committee on Management and Finance, and the Working Group on Enhancing the Efficiency of the OSCE (Reform Group), took place.

 

The PC did not take any decisions. It heard an address by the Minister for Foreign Affairs of Serbia and Montenegro Vuk Drašković, and the Head of the OSCE Centre in Dushanbe, Amb. Alain Couanon. The latter heavily attacked the administrative burden, imposed by Vienna, under which the mission was suffering. He said that administration made up at least half of the working time of his staff, and criticized that he was forced to travel to Vienna every couple of weeks. The U.S. ambassador very much welcomed this open criticism.

 

Under „Current Issues“, Germany informed about measures taken to combat trafficking in human beings in the context of the 2006 FIFA World Cup and Croatia (also on behalf of the Member States of the SEECP) summarized the results of the Summit of the South-East European Cooperation Process, held in Thessaloniki, Greece, on 4 May 2006. The Secretariat reported about the recent Expert Workshop on Urban Transport Security and the activities of the Office of the Coordinator of OSCE Economic and Environmental Activities related to energy security. Finally, I shortly briefed the Council about the appointment of PA Vice President Nevzat Yalçintas by the Chairman-in-Office to lead the OSCE Short-term Observers of the Referendum in Montenegro, Serbia and Montenegro, to be held on 21 May 2006. The Chairmanship announced the “Tolerance Implementation Meeting on Promoting Inter-cultural, Inter-religious and Inter-ethnic Understanding”, to be held in Almaty, Kazakhstan, on 12 and 13 June 2006.

 

The Reform Group discussed the topics “Examining the possibility of providing the OSCE with legal status and granting privileges and immunities” and “Further improving the program planning, so that it may better reflect the Organization’s priorities”. A majority of members of the Reform Group advocated the setting-up of a group of legal experts to make proposals, based on legal studies that have been undertaken in the past. Other delegations instead favored a group of representatives from participating States that are for and against major changes of the status of the organization. On the second point, the Secretary General explained his paper in which he discussed possibilities for a longer-term performance-based budget planning.

 

The timetable for the Program Outline (political discussion of the guidelines for the drafting of the 2007 budget proposal) has been published.

 

 

Andreas Nothelle

Ambassador OSCE PA

May 18, 2006