Committee on Information adopts 48 recommendations after considering two sets of proposals.

Committee on Information adopts 48 recommendations after considering two sets of proposals

The 70-member Committee on Information on 2 July adopted 48 recommendations dealing with various aspects of the establishment of a new world information and communication order and the work of the Department of Public Information (DPI). The Committee's substantive session had begun on 15 June. The set of recommendations was adopted by a roll-call vote of 50 in favour to 1 against (United States), with 13 abstentions (Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Federal Republic of Germany, Greece, Italy, Japan, Netherlands, Portugal, Spain, Turkey, United Kingdom). Put forward by the Group of 77 developing countries, they are to be considered in the General Assembly's Special Political Committee later in the year.

The recommendations were adopted after Committee Chairman Pablo Barrios of Spain had withdrawn a set of draft recommendations he had submitted earlier on the basis of consultations with regional groups and China.

The United States said it supported and encouraged the efforts of DPI's new Under-Secretary-General, Therese Paquet-Sevigny, to revitalize the Department. The draft adopted contained language that was fundamentally objectionable. Freedom of information must not be encumbered with the establishment of prescriptions or orders. Communications development and more just and effective global communications depended as much on the elimination of political barriers to the free flow of information as on the acquisition of new technology. The United States also opposed selective references to contentious political issues in the recommendations adopted.

"The universal character'

In his opening statement, Chairman Barrios called on Governments to "insist on the universal character of freedom of information'. The Committee, he said, must make useful and realistic recommendations to help improve DPI's efficiency and the Organization's image. DPI played a fundamental role in the process of reform under way in the United Nations, and all should contribute to its most efficient reorganization. The United Nations had a rich array of achievements in many fields which should be emphasized by DPI.

He called for a new, pragmatic approach with regard to a new world information order, based on concrete measures to help develop information infrastructures and human resources of developing countries.

In the area of freedom of information, there were clear imbalances...