19 February 2021
Turning to the Zero Draft. To the delegations that have observed that many of
their proposals are not reflected; Australia notes that no proposals are
reflected in full. For example: the sentiment of NAM proposals – if not the
verbatim wording - is reflected in many parts of the report (including, for
example, para 16, 28, 36, 49 and 50). Australia commends the Chair and
Secretariat for how well you have captured the breadth of views and plethora
of suggestions.
Australia can support every conclusion and recommendation in the Zero Draft
with very little comment. Like Egypt, we see value in retention of the
discussion section - but Australia would need to insert additional text to ensure
balanced representation of our views. Conscious of time, we will provide those
comments in writing.
At the same time, we have also heard many delegations express concern about
the length of the report, and the “some states” construction of the discussion
section. Indeed, it is a rare occasion that US, Russia, UK, China are all in
agreement: that we should focus on areas of convergence. In light of this, to
focus our discussion, Australia would support transferring
sentences/paragraphs from the discussion section that have the possibility of
receiving consensus support to the relevant conclusion sections, and deleting
the remainder discussions section. I emphasise that, while we would prefer to
not delete discussions section, we do not want to retain it at the cost of
running out of time to agree conclusions and recommendations.
I will now highlight specific paragraphs that could be moved from discussion
section, plus key Australian comments on the Zero draft [see: Australia’s
comments on Zero draft provided separately].
Finally, Australia associates itself with the statement delivered yesterday by
South Africa on behalf of the Survey co-sponsors. In closing, Australia
reiterates our commitment to the successful conclusion of this process. Cyber
threats are real and growing. The credibility of the UN as a forum that can
make progress on this issue is at stake. These issues are of growing importance
to every country every day. We have collectively put in a lot of hard work;
Australia looks forward to this being reflected in our final consensus report.
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