20 January 2025, New York — Statement on behalf of the European Union and its Member States by H.E. Ambassador Stavros Lambrinidis, Head of the Delegation of the European Union to the United Nations, at the Joint Briefing by the Presidents of the General Assembly and the the Economic and Social Council.
Presidents, colleagues,
I have the honour to speak on behalf of the European Union and its Member States.
The Candidate Countries North Macedonia, Montenegro, Albania, Ukraine, the Republic of Moldova, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Georgia, as well as Armenia, align themselves with this statement.
We highly appreciate the tradition of setting priorities at the beginning of each year to ensure coherence between the General Assembly and the Economic and Social Council.
The complex challenges that countries – and the UN – face today require all hands on deck, with the work of the GA and ECOSOC fully aligned.
2025 will be a pivotal year in this regard. With only five years to go to fully implement the SDGs, and with growing needs and inequalities in times of uncertainty, we must urgently work collectively on all three interrelated pillars, and ensure not just the UN’s willingness, but its effectivenessin achieving peace and security, sustainable development, and human rights for all.
President Yang,
We are confident that, with your agenda and under your leadership, much can be achieved in 2025. Your priorities presented last week showcased an impressive ambition to work towards addressing the numerous challenges we face. You can count on the EU support in your endeavours to ensure that the United Nations General Assembly fulfils its mission to leave no one behind.
We appreciate in particular your leadership, both in facilitating the successful Pact negotiations and, now, in following up on the Pact and its annexes. We welcome the four steps laid out towards its implementation.
Meeting with co-facilitators and co-chairs of relevant intergovernmental processes is the right first step. Indeed, the Pact implementation should be pursued in ongoing processes, where possible. Several of those are anchored within ECOSOC, underscoring the importance for both bodies working hand-in-hand.
Furthermore, we appreciate your convening of three informal and inclusive dialogues. You can count on our active participation to ensure the success of our efforts to reinvigorate our work at the UN and to turbo-charge the SDGs.
This, of course, cannot be done without the active engagement and involvement of civil society and the private sector. A Town Hall Meeting with civil society will be a crucial contribution to ensure full ownership in the Pact’s implementation.
President Rae,
Dialogue will indeed be key this year, under your stewardship. As the foundation of our work at the UN, dialogue will allow us to make progress and overcome divergence in ECOSOC. In your inaugural statement, you emphasised that your goal is to make ECOSOC open to contributions from all – to make it a true “House of the People”. I am glad to hear that your priorities are set to enable the achievement of this goal.
Dialogue should lead to Partnerships. We cannot achieve the SDGs each on our own, so we must identify joint priorities and deliverables in all aspects of sustainable development — here at the UN, but also at country level. With Global Gateway, the EU walks the talk and builds mutually-beneficial partnerships on the ground, delivering on the common ambitions that we define here together.
ECOSOC will have a busy year as it works to:
accelerate the implementation of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development
effectively follow up on the outcomes of the Summit of the Future, and
contribute to important global conferences and processes, such as the Fourth International Conference on Financing for Development (FFD4), the 2025 UN Ocean Conference, the World Social Summit, the 30th anniversary of the Fourth World Conference on Women and the adoption of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action (Beijing+30), the process for revitalisation of the Commission on the Status of women, as well as the review of the implementation of the outcome of the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS+20).
I can assure you that the EU and it Member States will actively participate in the work of ECOSOC and we will use these meetings to advocate for the implementation of the Pact for the Future to re-invigorate a more effective and inclusive multilateralism.
As you have rightly emphasised, we need deeper engagement between ECOSOC and international financial institutions, among others, also to ensure that FFD4 delivers on bridging the funding gap to meet global development goals.
This year marks an important opportunity to make tangible steps towards addressing the widening gap in gender equality. The EU will engage actively in the CSW revitalisation process, to strengthen the Commission’s purpose to serve women and girls around the world. The EU will also participate in the 69th Commission on the Status of Women in March, and the 58th Commission on Population and Development in April. SDG 5 (Achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls) is also one of the SDGs under in-depth review during this year’s High-Level Political Forum (HLPF).
And this brings me to my final point:
As every year, the ECOSOC cycle finishes with the HLPF.s. I am proud to announce that this year 5 EU Member States will present their VNR.
Presidents,
We are sure that under your guidance, the General Assembly and ECOSOC will deliver. In these challenging times, we must build on the strengths of both bodies, jointly reinforcing and complementing each other, while avoiding unnecessary duplication. You can count on the EU and its MS as your allies in this endeavour.
Thank you.
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