The PRESIDENT. We resume our formal meeting We have just failed in approving Programme of Work for the CD. There is nothing extraordinary about this. This has actually been the pattern for several months and years. Failure is apparently now part of our routine. We all have to reflect on the causes of it and how to overcome it.

I do not chink this is the appropriate time to draw lessons. Certainly, in my case, any analysis that I would try now would be tinged with a sense of personal frustration and emotions are not good counsellors for rational thinking. I may come back to that sometime in the future from the bench of Brazil. I do not need to explain either the gist of my efforts, how I tried to explore ambiguities in a positive way, how Itried to test the limits of the possible My text will speak for itself, with its possible merits and obvious shortcomings, I am asking the secretariat to circulate it as a CD document, not because I am under any illusion that what was considered as a basis in the last days will still be a basis in four or five months' time, but I thought in any case it would be useful to have that text as part of our records to show the general direction of the efforts we made collectively- At least it will demonstrate we did not give up easily.

As to the future of the CD, it is under great doubt. The CD is a tool, and a tool that is not used gets rusted. Will it be a tragedy if, as some have already even mentioned here, the CD disappears?I honestly do not know. Whatever will be deemed collectively indispensable by those who detain the power of destruction and annihilation will be done bilaterally, trilaterally, plurilaterally But for those of us who rely on multilateral ism, on the power of rational persuasion, and do not dispose in the same proportion - either because they cannot or do not want to have the force of arms, actual or potential - there will be a great loss. The system of world governance, if I may, use that word in a vital area such as security, will be tremendously impoverished. I hope it is not too late to prevent chat from happening

There is a positive side to those efforts that we all undertook, despite the fact that they did not succeed: the way we worked together, crying to look for reasons to be optimists in themidst of so many factors is encouraging. Clearly - and this was the case yesterday and today in the informal meetings - I received from a cross-section of the membership - at support not only encouragement for my efforts but also for my proposal as a basis for a consensus. And even from the others, who could not at least explicitly join these expressions, I received loyal, faithful support, and I am glad that they were able to agree that my non-paper was a basis for further consultations

This engagement, which existed all along shows that cynicism and unreasoned pessimism have not, or at least not yet, taken over the CD. I would like in this connection to quote from Amartya Sen, the famous Nobel Prize winner's recent essay in the New York Review of Books. -Unreasoned pessimism masquerading as composure based on realism and common sense can serve to 'justify' disastrous inaction and an abdication of public responsibility". Let us not succumb to it.

Finally, I wish to express once again my sincere appreciation for the invaluable support I received from Group Coordinators, as well as all other colleagues and their respective delegations, through these actually two months of presidency. I am also grateful to the Secretary-General of the CD, Mr. Petrovsky, and his deputv, Mr. Bensmail, for the way in which


(The President)

they put at my disposal their vast experience and expertise- I also want to thank the staff of the CD, as well as the interpreters. Finally, I am deeply indebted to my collaborators for their hard work and advice and, more importantly, the optimism they shared with me in the course of the Brazilian presidency of the CD.

The Russian Federation has asked for the floor.

Mr. SIDOROV (Russian Federation) (translated from Russian); Thank you, Mr. President. Ihave asked for the floor to thank you for your words of condolence on the occasion of the tragedy that struck the Russian nuclear submarine Kursk. Your condolences will be conveyed to the Russian Government and to the families of the crew members

The PRESIDENT; Thank you- No other requests for the floor?

The next plenary meeting of the Conference will be held on Thursday, 31 August 2000, at 10 a.m.

The meeting rose at 12.25 p.m.

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