A/56/PV.2 General Assembly

I should like to inform members that the following representatives have been elected Chairmen of the six Main Committees of the Assembly and are accordingly members of the General Committee for the fifty-sixth session: First Committee: Mr. André Erdós (Hungary) Special Political and Decolonization Committee (Fourth Committee): Mr. Hasmy Agam (Malaysia) Second Committee: Mr. Francisco Seixas da Costa (Portugal) Third Committee: Mr. Fuad Mubarak Al-Hinai (Oman) Fifth Committee: Mr. Nana Effah-Apenteng (Ghana) Sixth Committee: Mr. Pierre Lelong (Haiti) I congratulate the Chairmen on their election. Item 6 of the provisional agenda Election of the Vice-Presidents of the General Assembly

Pursuant to rule 31 of the rules of procedure, we shall now proceed to the election of the Vice-Presidents of the General Assembly. All members of the General Assembly are eligible in this election except those already represented in the General Committee, namely, those countries whose representatives have been elected to the presidency of the General Assembly or to the chairmanships of the Main Committees. In accordance with paragraphs 2 and 3 of the annex to resolution 33/138, the 21 Vice-Presidents of the General Assembly at its fifty-sixth session shall be elected according to the following pattern: Six representatives from African States; Four representatives from Asian States; One representative from an Eastern European State; Three representatives from Latin American and Caribbean States; Two representatives from Western European and other States; Representatives of the five permanent members of the Security Council. In accordance with paragraph 16 of annex VI to the rules of procedure, the election of the Vice- Presidents of the Assembly by secret ballot will be dispensed with when the number of candidates corresponds to the number of seats to be filled. We shall proceed accordingly. I shall now read the names of the endorsed candidates: African States: Democratic Republic of the Congo, Ethiopia, Libyan Arab Jamahiriya, Mauritania, Sierra Leone, South Africa. Asian States: Cambodia, Kyrgyzstan, Nepal, Saudi Arabia. Eastern European States: Republic of Moldova. Latin American and Caribbean States: Guatemala, Nicaragua, Paraguay. Western European and other States: Greece, Malta. Since the number of candidates corresponds to the number of seats to be filled in each region, I declare those candidates elected, in addition to the representatives of the five permanent members of the Security Council. The following States have therefore been elected to vice-presidencies of the General Assembly: Cambodia, China, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Ethiopia, France, Greece, Guatemala, Kyrgyzstan, the Libyan Arab Jamahiriya, Malta, Mauritania, Nepal, Nicaragua, Paraguay, the Republic of Moldova, the Russian Federation, Saudi Arabia, Sierra Leone, South Africa, the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and the United States of America. I wish to take this opportunity to congratulate the States which have been elected Vice-Presidents of the General Assembly. With the Chairmen of the six Main Committees and the 21 Vice-Presidents elected, the General Committee for the fifty-sixth session of the General Assembly has now been fully constituted in accordance with rule 38 of the rules of procedure. The 1st meeting of the General Committee will be held on Friday, 14 September 2001, at 10 a.m., in Conference Room 4. Letter from the Chairman of the Committee on Conferences (A/56/322)

The Assembly will now turn its attention to document A/56/322, which contains a letter dated 30 August 2001 from the Chairman of the Committee on Conferences addressed to the President of the General Assembly. Members are aware that, pursuant to section 1, paragraph 7, of Assembly resolution 40/243, no subsidiary organ of the General Assembly should be permitted to meet at United Nations Headquarters during the main part of a regular session of the Assembly, unless explicitly authorized by the Assembly. As indicated in the letter I have just mentioned, the Committee on Conferences recommended that the General Assembly authorize, among others, the Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People, the Executive Board of the United Nations Development Programme/United Nations Population Fund, as well as the Working Group on the Financing of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East, to meet during the main part of the fifty-sixth session. Having been informed by the Secretariat that the meetings of these three subsidiary organs will begin in the first week of the fifty-sixth session of the Assembly, may I take it that the General Assembly adopts the recommendation of the Committee on Conferences for these three subsidiary organs? It was so decided. Programme of work

I call on the representative of the Secretariat.

I should like to take this opportunity to draw the attention of all delegations to the note verbale that has been made available during the course of this meeting. As indicated in the note verbale, and in view of the postponement of the special session of the General Assembly on children in accordance with General Assembly resolution 56/401, it would be very helpful for the Secretariat in updating the list of speakers for the general debate, to be held from 24 September to 5 October 2001, if Member States could communicate their level of representation to the Secretariat by Monday, 17 September 2001, before 5 p.m.