The co-hosts of the High-Level Event on UN Reform, the governments of the United States, Canada, Germany, Indonesia, Japan, Jordan, Niger, Rwanda, Senegal, Slovakia, Thailand, United Kingdom, and Uruguay, in conjunction with 129 other UN Member States, jointly declare their support for the following:
We thank Secretary-General Guterres for acting on his commitments to develop a robust reform agenda in areas of peace and security, development, and management. We, representing the undersigned Member States of the United Nations, hereby declare our commitment to the principles outlined herein to support the Secretary-General’s leadership and transparency to initiate effective, meaningful reform to make the United Nations fit for purpose.
First, we declare our confidence in the Secretary-General’s reform initiatives and encourage him to lead organizational reform.
Second, we commit to strengthening partnership and trust between and among Member States and the Secretariat to support reform efforts for a more effective and efficient Organization.
Third, we commit to supporting the Secretary-General to advance stronger collaboration across the United Nations system for improved mandate delivery.
Fourth, we encourage the Secretary-General to pursue impactful and field-centric management reforms.
Fifth, we commit to supporting the Secretary-General’s progress in strengthening the United Nations system’s accountability framework through enhancing transparency, strengthening oversight, and aligning authority with responsibility.
Sixth, we commit to reducing mandate duplication, redundancy, and overlap, including among the main organs of the United Nations.
Seventh, we commit to supporting the Secretary-General in developing human resources management policies that enable the Organization to continue to attract, develop, and retain high-performing staff members, and to promote gender parity and geographic diversity.
Eighth, we support the Secretary-General in strengthening the Organization’s planning and budget functions to provide greater transparency and predictability on required resources.
Ninth, we support the Secretary-General in making concrete changes in the United Nations system to better align its work on humanitarian response, development, and sustaining peace initiatives.
Tenth, we recognize that each country has primary responsibility for its own economic and social development, and we further recognize the role of the United Nations in providing a platform for partnership to enable global sustainable development.
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