S/PV.7101 Security Council

The Security Council will now begin its consideration of the item on its agenda. Members of the Council have before them document S/2014/38, which contains the text of a draft resolution submitted by Australia, France, Jordan, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Nigeria, Rwanda, the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and the United States of America. It is my understanding that the Council is ready to proceed to the vote on the draft resolution before it. I shall put the draft resolution to the vote now.

There were 15 votes in favour. The draft resolution has been adopted unanimously as resolution 2133 (2014). I now give the floor to those members of the Council who wish to make statements after the voting.

First, I wish to reaffirm Argentina’s position condemning terrorism in all its forms and manifestations, as well as our commitment to the United Nations Global Counter- Terrorism Strategy. At the same time, I reiterate that the general framework for a response to terrorism must always be full respect for international law, international humanitarian law, international human rights law, and the purposes and principles of the Charter of the United Nations. Argentina recognizes that it is important for the issue of kidnapping for ransom as a possible form of financing for terrorist groups to begin to be considered in the framework of the United Nations so as to establish an explicit link between hostage-taking and terrorism, as it arises from the preamble of the International Convention against the Taking of Hostages, adopted by the General Assembly on 17 December 1979 (resolution 34/146, annex). At the same time, we understand that while this is a complex phenomenon, it is not universal but is limited to certain geographic regions. Given such complexity, which extends to definitions and legal details that are lacking in the resolution and that must be agreed on a multilateral basis, we believe that the phenomenon needs to be addressed at the multilateral level. Argentina believes that the response to a hostage situation or kidnapping should take its specific circumstances into account, and that we must prioritize the lives of hostages over other considerations. In this sense, we must consider the implementation of measures to identify, freeze, seize or confiscate the funds or other property constituting the proceeds of the crime of hostage-taking, as provided for by the International Convention against the Taking of Hostages, given that the Convention does not necessarily penalize the payment of ransom. All this makes it clear that resolution 2133 (2014) should be implemented via an approach conducive to advancing our consideration of the issue. Beyond promoting its discussion in the Counter-Terrorism Committee established pursuant to resolution 1373 (2001), the Council has decided to call upon all Member States to cooperate closely, clearly recognizing the need for expert-level discussions in the broader context of the United Nations and other relevant international and regional organizations. Argentina believes that, beyond not establishing new legal obligations for Members, the resolution has the symbolic value of reflecting the Council’s unanimous agreement that dialogue should be initiated on ways of combating this particular form of financing of terrorism. Such United Nations dialogue, which Argentina supports, must take place in the context of the General Assembly, which is not only the competent forum, but which will also ensure the participation of all Member States in a matter of such importance in order to move towards the necessary consensus.

The Security Council has thus concluded the present stage of its consideration of the item on its agenda.