Statement by Stephen L. Lieberman, Counselor for UN Management and Reform, on the financing of United Nations pacekeeping operations before the Fifth (Administrative and Budgetary) Committee of the UN General Assembly

Stephen Lieberman
Counselor for UN Management and Reform 
U.S. Mission to the United Nations 

New York, NY

May 11, 2011

AS DELIVERED

Mr. Chairman,

As my delegation has said in this committee on many occasions, the United States fully supports the peacekeeping activities of this Organization. We are committed to adequately fund these activities to ensure that our mandates are fully implemented. We willingly accept our obligation to support the men and women, uniformed and civilian who do the difficult work of this Organization.

At the same time, Mr. Chairman, the total amount of the proposed budgets we have before us is almost identical to the amount of the budgets that we adopted for the previous financial period discounting the closed MINURCAT mission. In light of the difficult global economic climate and the financial constraints facing each of our respective governments, it is essential that we carefully scrutinize these budgets and find efficiencies where we can.    

As my delegation said in this committee on Monday, the United States welcomes the efforts of the Secretary-General in continuing the trend toward fiscally responsible and realistic budgets.  In this regard, my delegation would like to emphasize that it is clearly within the purview of the Secretary-General, as the Chief Administrative Officer of this Organization under Article 97 of the Charter, to direct managers to seek efficiencies during the preparation of the budgets.  In fact, it is his responsibility to ensure efficiency and good stewardship of the funding that we Member States provide to the Organization on behalf of our taxpayers.

In closing, Mr. Chairman, I reiterate my delegation’s commitment to working constructively with all members of this committee to adequately resource our peacekeeping operations.

Thank you.

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