Debate over new format of the Report of the Working Group

At the adoption of the Report of the Working Group of Afghanistan, the President of the Working Group, H.E Martin Ihoeghian Uhomoibhi, proposed a new format for the Reports. Due to the size of those reports too often exceeding the word limit (9,630), he suggested to suppress recommendations from section I of Reports and only mention them in section II, apart for recommendations that differ from one section to another.

Following this proposal, several delegations took the floor to give their view on it.

First to take the floor, the United Kingdom was not ready to accept the new format if its own comments were not better reflected in the section I. Following, Germany asked to increase the number of words limit and proposed to set up a working group.

On the other hand, Pakistan and Egypt said that this proposal was the only one acceptable and stated that no reopening of previous agreements could be done. On the same note, South Africa called for acceptance of this format and said that discussions on the words limit should be made at another time and place.

After hearing those different views, the new format was finally adopted.