CD's decision on enhancing the engagement
of civil society in the work of the Conference
12 February 2004
CD.PV/946
“1. Non-governmental organizations
(NGOs) shall continue to be allowed to attend formal plenary
meetings of the Conference and to be seated in the public
gallery.
“2. NGOs shall be entitled, upon request,
to receive official documents of the plenary meetings of
the Conference.
“3. NGOs shall be entitled, at their
own expense, twice per annual session, to make written material
available to the members of the Conference outside the conference
hall.
“4. After the CD adopts a programme
of work, it will allocate one informal plenary meeting per
annual session to NGOs to address the Conference.
“5. Only NGOs whose activities are
relevant to the work of the Conference will be able to address
the Conference on Disarmament. Therefore, a formal selection
process will be put in place to consider requests from NGOs
to address the Conference. Requests from NGOs will be made
to the President of the Conference on Disarmament through
the secretariat of the Conference on Disarmament. These
requests will be considered at Presidential consultations
and thereafter at a formal plenary meeting of the Conference.”
After this text was adopted, the President
of the CD noted the following:
The PRESIDENT: It is my understanding that
with respect to the selection process on requests made by
NGOs, the final decision for NGOs to address the Conference
on Disarmament would be given by a formal plenary meeting
of this Conference in the same way as it gives approval
to decisions that are put before it by consensus.
[snip]
Now, with regard to the decision that we
took on civil society, I just wanted to make clear what
the understanding is with regard to plenary documents that
will be provided to civil society if they so request. It
has always been my understanding that the plenary documents
that are referred to in that decision relate to the plenary
meeting documents that bear the symbol CD, and not to any
texts, any rolling texts, any negotiating texts, any informal
texts that we may have before the CD.
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