The Italian Minister of Foreign Affairs' salute to the RomeMUN2013 delegates

The World We at the RomeMUN Want 2015

What is happiness?

Minorities between mediator and State

Rome,11/03/13- On Saturday, the Security Council began discussing the working-paper. Togo, Luxembourg and France are the sponsors and Argentina , Azerbaijan, Russian Federation, Rwanda, and UK are the signatories. The main idea is to create a group of people who will have to be the mediators between the State and its minorities. Countries like the Republic of Korea and Azerbaijan requested France to be more precise about the working paper which seemed to be , in their opinion , rather abstract and elusive.

Pakistan , China and UK agreed with the idea that this kind of proposition is on too much of an intervenist level. They emphasized that territorial integrity should be respected. They think that the only way to reduce the problems surrounding minorities problems is to bestow them with their own autonomy. Also, Pakistan proposed an amendment which followed the idea that the minorities should be integrated in the administration and in the power of the country in order to be heard. The ultimate goal would be to pass from assimilation to the association.

Australia didn't agree with the working-paper because they thought about a military intervention in order to give strong power to those mediators. As we all saw, the weather today was wonderful so, an Australian delegate, who didn't feel listening, decided to leave the negociations and certainly go visit Rome.

Morocco didn't follow the plan. As we know Sharawi from « western Sahara » has been stating their right to autonomy for 50 years, a right which the government has expressly rejected . That's why they don't want any assistance from, the United Nations in this regard.

In the end the main questions were about the aftermath of that project. The draft-paper was finally accepted by the chairs. France had 2 minutes to introduce that to the floor. Now, it's time to put modifications and vote, as the delegate of Azerbaijan said : « Everybody should propose their amendments, please try not to abuse of your power, try to be constructive ».

 

Yesterday, the SC continued to discuss about self-determination. A Draft resolution has been presented and lot of emendments were added by different countries. One of them presented an emendment in order “to condemn secessionist movements that are opposed to international law and the Charter of the UN”, but it did not pass.

Then, countries voted the final resolution proposed by France, Togo, and Azerbaijan, and it was approved with 3 against, 3abstentions and 9 in favor.

Some countries such as Pakistan voted in favour because they agreed too some emedements added such as integration of minorities into administration proposed by chinese delegation.

DANNEAUX Clémence, DE LA TULLAYE Angélique , PELLOILLE Océane ( Al-Jazeera)

Education: first steps to collaboration

Rome, 11/03/13 - “By five o’clock there is going to be a resolution: no one of delegates will go out until that moment.” That was stated by the chairman on Saturday. 

Since the 8th of march, the delegates of UNESCO have been trying to propose a strong resolution to educational problem, something really “concrete”, as Australia’s delegate has repeatedly stressed.

The first draft resolution, sponsored by Australia, Pakistan, Togo, Malawi and Ethiopa, has been signed by seventeen countries, achieving the quorum.

According to these countries, financial supports is strictly necessary to ensure the continuation of the positive development. 

This must be achieved by the reduction of taxes and trade barriers and proposing favorable conditions of settlement for companies committed to build educational infrastructures.

Nevertheless interviewing the delegation of Sri Lanka, emerged how sometimes countries put on the top of their agenda the financial topic only because by means of helping the developing countries they build a strong and positive public image.

Nowadays the school is not only about studying: it is a place where improving knowledge and values too. Moreover, school is where you learn to live and to match yourself with the others.
In this kind of place ensuring equality is a Must.

This is perfectly clear also to the Republic of Chile, together with the delegations of the Republic of Argentina, the Republic of Cuba, Republic of Guatemala, Paraguay, Republic of Peru and Uruguay.

These countries, beyond the financial and infrastructural issues, have caught the attention of the assembly especially on the issues of gender discrimination and the sexual education.

In the rural regions and in the underdeveloped countries there is not a strong knowledge about sexuality and according to these delegations, to prevent abuses, rapes and violence is extremely important to organize campaigns and teaching how to respect the diversities in all their shades.

The delegation of Luxembourg’s suggestion, to have an unmoderated caucus to discuss together all the drafts come out, shows how even in the most complicated situation, the pure and clear collaboration is essential. 

 

The time of reaching a resolution has come. 

The delgates of all the countries present yesterday, 10.03.2013, in Unesco’s meeting, are going to vote.

After several discussions, the assembly decided to procede on drafts’judgment.

The drafts 1.1 and 1.2, do not reach the quorum because mostly of the countries explicitly disagree: 23 delgations for the 1.1 and 33 for the 1.2 voted NO.
Something different happens for the draft 1.3, proposed by Tunisia and United Arabian Emirates.
The delegations succeeded in cooperation and the draft has the support of almost the totality of the assembly: indeed 34 countries voted YES.

Giulia Cardamone
Diana Tasayco
(Al-Jazeera)

Loan and Recommendation options divide WB Committee

Rome,11/03/13 - On Saturday, the second meeting of the World Bank Committee was still stalling on the first agenda topic (Target 8.a). It was hard for delegations to reach an agreement on how to achieve an open, rule-based, predictable, non-discriminatory trading and financial system. All delegates acknowledged the need for a global partnership. 

However, two different lines emerged from the discussion. On the one hand, France pushed hard for passing a recommendation on a sustainable free trade and financial system, as well as on continued agricultural enhancement, in the long run. In advocating this, France was sponsored by the US. "We want to provide people living in least developed countries (LDCs) with long-lasting skills to achieve sustainable development. That's why we believe that a recommendation would be more effective than delivering financial aid. In a nutshell, it's better to teach people how to catch fish on their own, rather than provide them with something that will disappear in the long-run", the US delegate told RussiaToday.

On the other hand, a group of countries led by South Africa, Morocco, Kenya and Argentina has proposed the WB to deliver further loans to LDCs, as they believe that financial aid provided so far has not produced satisfactory outcomes. Financial support would be targeted at improving agriculture, industry and stimulating the use of renewables in the public sector.

Russia was also in favour of a loan, which it considers a concrete measure to tackle obstacles to development in several countries. “What we care about is providing pragmatic solutions” the Russian delegate stated. Yet, Russia decided not to join the above-mentioned group of countries proposing a loan to LDCs, as it believes that the signatories lack the financial and political weight needed to actually support them. The Russian delegation is thus cooperating with China and Saudi Arabia to fund development projects in Mongolia, the Caucasus, and Iraq.

Yesterday, the conclusive session of the WB (World Bank) Committee took place. After three days of intensive works, the possibility of a real compromise still seems quite far. Several strategies to achieve MDG 8.a have been drawn up, but they have been more influenced by local and regional interests rather than the will of meeting halfway. Despite the hesitation, the most supported line is the one led by Russian Federation and China, which focuses on a loan to improve infrastructures and transports. This loan proposal would actually involve areas in need of financial support and at the same time have the potential for economic growth.

Eleonora Amabili

Gianmarco Ventura (Russia Today)

The delegates of the WHO Committee en route to an agreement

Rome,11 March 2013 - The delegates have convened at LUISS University to further discuss and debate the issues tackled by the WHO. 

Throughout the second day of work, the delegates of WHO committee have been trying to agree about the final resolution. The draft resolution has shown the common willingness of an education program and campaigns through software, a strong prevention of HIV, medical assistance and also a global fund. Despite this, many clauses are still controversed, but the delegates during the unmoderated caucus we have witnessed, seemed to be highly motivated to find a good balance among the proposals. China, Kuwait and North Korea, for example, argued about whether to add the formula "sexual education" in the operative clauses about combating HIV and other major diseases. China was against such expressions and suggested to replace it with "family-planning measures".  

The financial aspect of the discussion has similarly divided the delegates : the representatives failed to reach an agreement about the amount of money (1% of GDP) to contribute for the creation of an international fund dedicated to the fight against HIV, and the measures and methods of investing the financial aid already provided. Nonetheless, all members agreed to gradually increase the global HIV fund instead of creating an international bank.  At the end of a fruitful  debate all the delegates contributed actively, especially the delegation of Albania: they suggested several times proposals in order to focus the attention on prostitution and sex workers with regards to HIV issue.   

The resolution paper for the first topic proposed mostly focused on solutions for the HIV issue, but after a request from Honduras' delegate, a point concerning the prevention of other diseases was also included in the discussion. 

During the conference, two emendments proposed by the Democratic People's Republic of Korea have been approved: one concerning the monitoring of water sources to prevent the spread of malaria and another one to continue the vaccination against tuberculosis, malaria and polio in the affected, often rural, areas. Another important aspect that emerged from the meeting is the impact of civil society - for instance the role played by the Bill and Melissa Gates Foundation, the David and Victoria Beckham and the Qatar Foundation - in sponsoring the fight against HIV.  

 Once again, the delegates debated and negotiated to reach an agreement that in the next two days will hopefully be finalized. The document will hopefully bind the participant countries in the fight against HIV, malaria, tuberculosis and other deadly illnesses that cripple wealthy but most importantly poor societies. Because, although in different ways, the issues tackled by the WHO are problems that concern us all as citizens of the world.  

Also during the last day of work, the WHO Committee underlined the importance of collaboration between countries. The most interesting points of the resolution dealt with discounting drugs' prices reducing the importation taxes and increasing those on alcohol and tobacco, in order to use this income to finance researches; this could also be achieved by focusing the WHO's attention on regional organizations like MERCOSUR and the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC). Moreover there is a cultural problem: the population of poor areas is often not aware of the possibility to have access to medicines. 

To improve the situation, delegates proposed to create some information programs about everyone's right to medical assistance. According to the delegates, this could be achieved by fostering public-private partnerships, also possibly setting up a Food and Drug Authority to increase the control on illegal drugs entering the country. During the discussion, small disagreements – raised by the Albanian delegate – among the signatories relented the process. Despite this, the delegates managed to reach an overall agreement that will hopefully set the international community's agenda to ensure the achievement of the MDG and the eradication of HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis, malaria and other illnesses by 2015. The negotiations have now ended and the delegates await the closing ceremony to be held tomorrow.

Article written by:

 Jessica di Paolo 

Chiara Zanchetta 

Chiara Ravazzotto 

Marta Lamalfa 

Ernest Amankwah 

Isotta Rodriguez Pereira 

Alessia Pascazio (BBC)