Permanent Mission of the Republic of Korea to the United Nations

Special Committee on the Charter of the United Nations and on the Strengthening of the Role of the Organization

Thank you, Madam Chair.

First of all, my delegation would like to extend warm congratulations to you on your election as Chair of the Special Committee on the Charter of the United Nations and on the strengthening of the Role of the Organization.

My delegation also notes with appreciation the report of the Secretary-General outlining the progress made by the Secretariat in updating the Repertory of Practice of United Nations organs, and Repertoire of the Practice of the Security Council. The improvements made to reduce the backlog of these publications are particularly noteworthy.

Madam Chair,

During the General Assembly meetings last October, a number of delegations pointed out that various challenges had yet to be overcome to increase the efficiency of the Special Committee. Duplication of efforts was a recurring concern not only in the consideration of outstanding issues and proposals, but also in the exchange of views about the working methods of the Committee and identification of new subjects.

We believe that our discussion will be more productive and efficient once we identify the challenges facing the Special Committee in rendering its work more effective, and its shortcomings in galvanizing the political will of Member States, and then make concerted and focused efforts to address those issues.

In this context, my delegation would like to suggest decreasing the frequency, and adjusting the duration of the sessions of the Special Committee. It is incumbent upon us to maximize the utility of the limited resources. As such, issues and proposals sitting dormant for an extended period of time in this Special Committee need to be revisited with a fresh look, in order to make our discussion more practical and productive.

My delegation would also like to reiterate the importance of consistency between the activities of the Special Committee and other principal organs of the UN. In this connection, the work of the Special Committee should be reviewed to ensure that overlaps and duplications of efforts in the entire UN system are minimized to the extent practicable.

With regard to the remarks made by the representative of the DPRK on the status of the United Nations Command, it is regrettable that the representative of the DPRK repeats, as in the previous sessions, biased and unsubstantiated interpretations against well-established facts.

The repetition of misleading allegations by the DPRK time and again is clearly one of the worst cases that the limited resources allocated to this Committee are dissipated without any constructive outcome. Having said that, my delegation would like to clarify some points very briefly regarding the United Nations Command to help distinguished delegates better understand the issue.

There is no doubt that the United Nations Command was created by the UN Security Council legally, according to resolutions 82 to 85 and 88 against the armed attack upon the Republic of Korea by forces from North Korea in 1950. The validity of these resolutions has been reaffirmed by various subsequent practices of the Council and also by the advisory opinion of the International Court of Justice on 21 June 1971.

Regarding the position of the United Nations Secretariat on this issue, my delegation believes it suffices to point to the fact that the Spokesperson for the Secretary-General of the United Nations has already officially announced that The UN Secretariat did not take a formal position on the United Nations Command in a letter to the Korean press, on 24 March 2006.

Finally, my delegation would like to make some brief comments on the nonsensical and preposterous allegations by the representative of the DPRK on its long-range ballistic missile launch on the heels of its fourth nuclear test.

In July 1991, DPRK made application for membership in the United Nations in accordance with Article 4 of the Charter of the United Nations, thus accepting the obligations contained in the Charter. On that occasion, Kim Yong Nam, the then Vice-Premier of the Administration Council and Minister for Foreign Affairs of the DPRK, made a declaration which reads: “On behalf of the Government of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, I solemnly declare that the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea accepts the obligations contained in the Charter of the United Nations and undertakes to fulfill them.”

Nevertheless, DPRK has consistently breached this solemn pledge. As a case in point, for the past decade only, DPRK has conducted as many as four nuclear tests and six long-range ballistic missile launches, all in contravention of its own pledge, Security Council resolutions, and the Purposes, Principles, and Obligations enshrined in the Charter of the United Nations.

These persistently unruly behaviors by DPRK are not only a “clear threat” to international peace and security by any measure, as repeatedly confirmed by the Security Council resolutions, but also constitute a sheer affront to the UN Charter and a blatant challenge to the international community, compelling us to call into question its qualifications as a member of the UN.

Concluding the remarks, my delegation would like to emphasize that this Special Committee is not to be abused as a forum to challenge a well-functioning UN entity which has been established according to all due legal procedures of the Security Council or to justify grave violations of the UN Charter and Security Council resolutions with absurd allegations.

Thank you, Madam Chair. /END/