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Post Executive Session Briefing
Media Centre Conference Room
Joel Kibazo
Saturday, 2 March 2002
MR JOEL KIBAZO: All right, I apologise for the slight delay
… because I think Prime Minister Helen Clark was still doing
a briefing in the next room and I think - I'm just waiting to see
if she's finished hers otherwise …would go in to her …
All right. Okay, here we are. As I explained, the first executive
session was rather delayed at the beginning of today but it started
at about 2.30, 2.45, I think, eventually, and just in a very quick
outline, the subjects covered included terrorism, the promotion
of the Commonwealth and political values and the global economic
development. Those were the main subjects and then I thought I'd
talk, or rather speak, to each of those.
The Heads of Government and Heads of Delegation had a presentation
on terrorism that was actually done by Foreign Minister Alexander
Downer of Australia, who chaired a ministerial group on terrorism
that they had in London and what they adopted and after - after
a rather, sort of rather friendly debate, in which I think there
weren't too many disagreements on either side, the Heads of Government
decided to adopt a plan of action on terrorism - a Commonwealth
plan of action on terrorism. This will be coming out, hopefully
now, or at least hopefully it should have been distributed to you,
if not it will be done in a few moments.
That plan includes both, sort of, legal measures, which, you know,
it's a support, Security Council resolution - sorry, to support
Security Council resolution 1373 including legal assistance and
to help the countries that are unable or at least are not yet able
to support that with their capacity building.
The other thing that was included within those measures that the
heads of government have agreed to take financial measures as in
line with what's been adopted on 25th October in their statement,
25 October 2001. And the other - and then following on that they
also said they will try and advance practical law enforcement co-operation
across the Commonwealth to try - which will include sort of shared
laws and, you know, shared experiences and to try and sort of co-ordinate
on issues to do with terrorism. As I said, that paper is around
so - but then you can also ask questions at the end but that paper
is around.
The other thing that Heads of Government adopted was what was called
the Commonwealth Functional Corporation or Report of the Committee
as a whole. In this, the - this is the report to do with - with
the way governments co-operate, and technical and developmental
assistance, and most of the recommendations in, you know, in that
report were adopted. And this deals with the activities over the
past few years of the secretariat and all Commonwealth organizations.
Just very quickly, once again, these can be picked up - this can
be picked up straight after the briefing. So the only reason was
that we were running slightly late.
They talked about further development of the Commonwealth Fund
for Technical Development, the Commonwealth Services Abroad Program
and Trade and Development Access Facility, and urged each of their
countries to give greater resources to fund those organizations.
The report covers the work of secretariat in areas such as the promotion
of sustainable development, that - strengthening financial assistance,
corporate governance, combating corruption and money laundering
and promoting private investment.
In addition, it talks about promoting general equality, co-operation
in the legal sector. The report also noted the efforts made by the
Commonwealth in eliminating the gender disparities and promoting
the rule of law in member countries.
Heads of Government also considered the sister organizations of
the Commonwealth and the work done since the last CHOGM and in the
group sense of Commonwealth learning, a Commonwealth foundation
and the partnership for technical management and the Commonwealth
Parliamentary Association, just to name a few. I'm just running
through these and then maybe there will be sort of questions.
The Heads of Government then turned to the issue of the promotion
of Commonwealth fundamental political values and, really, what they
did here is to sort of endorse the return of, within that - the
return, they considered CMAG and, in that they noted the return
of Fiji to the Commonwealth since the election - return from suspension
from the council since the election of September. They also talked
about the countries such as Gambia has been removed from - and also
- and then the - and sorry - and then they dealt with the issue
of - the proceedings then turned to the issue of Zimbabwe and the
- its inclusion on the CMAG agenda.
At this stage they had decided that the best way of handling Zimbabwe
- and they did hold a debate on Zimbabwe - was to refer it to the
retreat which will be tomorrow to decide. There was - of course,
the Chairman, Prime Minister Howard, said that there are various
positions on Zimbabwe and so the best thing to do was to adopt other
recommendations of CMAG but to defer any conversation on Zimbabwe
to tomorrow's meeting and, as I explained, that will be in retreat
when hopefully they'll be able to exchange views vigorously.
Then following that, they talked about global economic development,
including the way globalisation was affecting different parts of
the Commonwealth in different ways and also look forward to the
Sustainable Development Conference that is due to take place and
urge governments and member states to sort of play a part within
and then have a serious input into those proceedings that are to
take place in March.
Following that, what they did is to adopt reports from the Commonwealth
Business Council and the Commonwealth - the Commonwealth Business
Council - and hold on - sorry, I apologise I can't read my own writing
- and the Commonwealth Foundation. That is just a sort of general
and quick roundup of some of the things that they discussed. As
I said, I'm not allowed to talk about who said what individually.
What I can do perhaps is perhaps give you a flavour if asked about
the range of opinion that there was on certain issues.
QUESTION: How long was the discussion on Zimbabwe and what
was the content of the discussion or was there none at all?
MR KIBAZO: How long do you mean - in terms of time? It wasn't
actually very long because at the outset of - when it came to the
review of the developments of CMAG the, you know, the Chairman had
indicated that it might be a good idea if discussion of Zimbabwe
and anything to do with Zimbabwe is deferred to the retreat. Now,
of course, most of them adopted that position of deferring the conversation
to tomorrow. There are - as you would expect, there was some comments
from some quarters saying that "Look, even though it's going
to be tomorrow, we think vis-à-vis that it should not be
on CMAG and it should not be looked at in this way". However,
and on the other hand, others thought that Zimbabwe should be. But
- so the debate didn't last very long because … that tomorrow
would really be the day when they would give it a lot of time rather
than spend time today.
QUESTION: Just on Fiji returning to the Commonwealth: was
that noted as procedural or was there any discussion of Fiji's return?
MR KIBAZO: No, they … on Fiji and of course the fact
that on CMAG, it's return, but they also did say that, you know,
CMAG should continue to monitor developments in Fiji, particularly
in view of the court case, that the court action that's currently
proceeding.
QUESTION: On the legislation, anti-terrorism legislation,
did any countries offer help or any countries particularly ask for
help in drafting legislation?
MR KIBAZO: Sorry, I didn't hear the first - did any?
QUESTION: Did any countries offer help or ask for help in
drafting legislation, anti-terrorist legislation?
MR KIBAZO: No, no countries asked for help because the thing
is they all agree to co-operate. Now, that co-operation can take
different forms. In some cases they may look to see if strengthening
their legal mechanism to adopt terrorist measures will be the correct
thing but no particular country actually said "What we lack
is a legal framework in which to adopt our measures".
QUESTION: Did … ask for help. Did they say our legislation
…?
MR KIBAZO: No, not at all.
QUESTION: On the terrorism stuff again, did the Heads of
Government dwell on the fact that six Commonwealth members are on
the Financial Action Task Force concerning non-cooperation on money
laundering and, if they did, what did they agree these six countries
should do?
MR KIBAZO: They didn't - that wasn't a subject that came
up during the course of debate.
QUESTION: On the financial money laundering … that
you have, is there any contingent or will be any assistance offered
to a country that will be adversely affected by it. Clearly their
economies will be affected. Is any contingent in place as to how
they will be treated after that …?
MR KIBAZO: As I said, there are still some discussions to
go on the whole area of economic - on the global economic environment.
So some of that may come out later but in the first session that
was not something that they talked about, no.
QUESTION: Will that be discussed at this CHOGM?
MR KIBAZO: I don't know. It depends if particular countries
decide that's what they want to talk about.
QUESTION: I'm just wondering, in the context of the discussions
about terrorism, was there - has the tone towards Pakistan changed
in the view of the Commonwealth?
MR KIBAZO: Has Pakistan changed the view?
QUESTION: The view of Pakistan, has that changed given their
statements about terrorism and in the context of this statement
today?
MR KIBAZO: There was a debate on Pakistan but actually it
wasn't so much in the context of terrorism. The debate on Pakistan
was in the context of the return to democracy and the road for the
return to democracy and, in that sense, they noted the developments
and the progress that has been made by General Musharraf but they
also decided that if Pakistan should remain suspended from the council
of the Commonwealth, so Pakistan was discussed but it was not in
the context of the terrorism debate.
QUESTION: Was there any discussion at all regarding climate
change particularly among the South Pacific nations and the agreement
struck between Australia and the United States on that?
MR KIBAZO: Not at this session.
QUESTION: When is that …
MR KIBAZO: I don't know but that did not come up during
this session
QUESTION: Can you tell us if the - in the discussion on
Zimbabwe, was there a suggestion that … report on the form
the Commonwealth needs to be adopted before any further decisions
can be made about Zimbabwe?
MR KIBAZO: No, the discussion - I think what's going to
happen is that the heads wanted a long period of quite, sort of,
a substantial period in the program to discuss Zimbabwe and it is
for that reason that they decided that anything to do with Zimbabwe
would be discussed tomorrow at the retreat. So in that context,
no
QUESTION: Had the Heads of Government adopted the provisions
dealing with the developments of CMAG's role. Have they taken any
decision on how CMAG … should be clarified or strengthened
and, if so, what, or what is recommended?
MR KIBAZO: I didn't hear the last part of your question.
QUESTION: Have they made any decisions, have they agreed
to the clarification or strengthening of CMAG's role or, in fact,
what is recommended in the … report on that?
MR KIBAZO: The high level review, you mean - they are still
going to discuss - I mean, there was a very brief discussion but
they will be looking at some of that again; probably there's still
a few days to go yet. So they haven't yet adopted everything there
is to do behind every review … In the context of Zimbabwe,
as I said, for a start, the high level review was not the reason
why either - Zimbabwe was not the reason why they set up the high
level review but - and I think in answer to your question I think
there will be sort of (inaudible) still debate to happen in the
next two days.
QUESTION: The plan of action on terrorism says that countries
which don't help fight terrorism should have no place in it. How
is the Commonwealth going to police how countries act against terrorism?
Are you going -
MR KIBAZO: Have no place in it.
QUESTION: How is the Commonwealth going to police how various
countries deal with terrorism? Are you going to send in teams or
prepare some sort of reports on how they've gone?
MR KIBAZO: I mean, what they did today is look at the measures
included within the report and what the Ministers had decided on
the 29th of January, when they met. The actual delivery of some
of those points I think is still to be clarified. What they considered
today was the report from the Ministers at that meeting, adopt the
principles agreed at that meeting by the committee on terrorism.
Then I think some of the detail … but this was their first
chance virtually to discuss the subject since, you know, that ministerial
meeting in January
QUESTION: So who will determine what happens from there?
MR KIBAZO: Sorry? Well, the heads themselves will determine.
I am just sort of referring to what has happened today.
QUESTION: Did India refer about Pakistan in the talks about
terrorism?
MR KIBAZO: No. All right? Any other issues? All right, thank
you very much.
ENDS
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