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UNCED WORKING GROUP HIGHLIGHTS: 7 NOVEMBER 1992
The next meeting of the Razali Group convened Saturday morning with discussion on Razali's revised draft of CRP.7, which had been considerably streamlined. Debate was delayed while governments worked on final changes to paragraph 5 that called on all concerned to implement the commitments, agreements and recommendations reached at UNCED, "in particular those related to finance, technology and capacity building, in order to achieve sustainable development in all countries." When debate began, Razali moved paragraph-by-paragraph through the new text. While the G-77 attempted to blend the concerns of the EC with those of its member states and China, consensus was not reached by the end of the meeting and final resolution of this paragraph was postponed until interested delegations could work out a compromise.
The G-77 proposed two additional paragraphs to the enabling resolution: one that takes note of the financial commitments made by countries at UNGA-47 and urges other developed countries to announce their commitments; and a paragraph that would place UNCED review as a permanent agenda item of the General Assembly. Consensus was reached on both paragraphs. Agreement was also reached on the convening of a special session for the purposes of review and appraisal of Agenda 21 not later than 1997 and that the Secretary-General will submit a report with recommendations on the format, scope and organizational aspects of the session to be considered and approved by UNGA-49.
Razali then called for initial comments on revision 1.0 of the draft resolution for a conference on the sustainable development of small island developing States. The document was well received, especially in light of the change of date from June 1993 to April 1994. Further discussion was postponed to the following session.
The G-77 then introduced the draft resolution establishing an intergovernmental negotiating committee for the elaboration of an international convention to combat desertification in those countries experiencing serious drought and/or desertification, particularly in Africa. They hoped that this "procedural" draft resolution to set up the INC would not have long discussions.