Plenary meeting of the Non-Aligned Movement/UNESCO – Paris Chapter was held

The next plenary meeting of the Non-Aligned Movement/UNESCO – Paris Chapter, chaired by Azerbaijan, was held at the UNESCO Headquarters in Paris, France.

The Permanent Delegates of the NAM Member States to UNESCO, Observers, representatives of the UNESCO Secretariat, President of the 41^st session of the UNESCO General Conference, Ambassador, Permanent Delegate of the Federative Republic of Brazil Mr. Santiago Irazabal Mourão and Secretary of the Convention for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage Mr. Timothy Curtis attended the meeting.

Opening the Plenary meeting, Ambassador Elman Abdullayev noted that COVID-19 still greatly influences on our lives, creates the new challenges, new difficulties. COVID-19 is one of the main death causes for the last 2 years all over the world.

The President of the UNESCO General Conference, Santiago Irazabal Mourão, said that since his election his first visit was to Angola for attending the Luanda Biennale.

Noting that there are challenges in the Organization, as well as in the world, the President of the General Conference called on to work together through dialogue in order to overcome these problems.

At the meeting there were discussed the challenges facing the education sector, as well as the Small Island Developing States (SIDS), and the negative impact of the pandemic.

Permanent delegates of many countries expressed their views on the elimination of illiteracy, the negative effects of the pandemic, fake news, hate speech, and said that the SIDS are among the priorities of UNESCO.

Priority Africa of the Organization and the richness of the culture of the countries of this continent were also touched upon, and the importance of increasing attention in this direction was stressed. The issues of protection of cultural heritage, strengthening the fight against illicit trafficking of cultural properties were discussed.

Deliberations covered many UNESCO programs, the importance of working on them as well as the essence of strengthening multilateralism were emphasized.

Tim Curtis, Secretary of the UNESCO Convention for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage, informed about the forthcoming 16^th session of the Intergovernmental Committee for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage. He informed that during the session, short presentations will be held if the nominations submitted to the Representative List of Intangible Cultural Heritage are inscribed.

Ambassador Elman Abdullayev presented the Summary Records of the Plenary held in September of the current year. Afterwards the Summary Records were adopted.

He noted that within the framework of the 41^st session of the General Conference, high-level representatives of 193 Member States, delegates from various NGOs and experts attended the meetings of the Commissions and the Committees, and discussed the challenges of our time.

During the General Conference, the Member States expressed readiness to continue their joint activities, stressed the importance of more effective multilateralism, and noted that the Draft Medium-Term Strategy had identified priorities for education, climate change, social cohesion and peace in order to address the existing challenges.

Then the Report of the Chair on the global activities of the Azerbaijani presidency and activities of the Movement's UNESCO – Paris Chapter was heard.  

The candidatures of NAM Member States were discussed and the meeting continued with discussions on various issues.