Ireland appointed to lead UN negotiations on a new Global Development Agenda

The Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade, Charlie Flanagan T.D., and the Minister of State for Development, Trade Promotion and North-South Cooperation, Seán Sherlock T.D., have warmly welcomed Ireland’s appointment by the United Nations to lead international negotiations over the coming year on a new global development agenda to succeed the Millennium Development Goals.

The President of the UN General Assembly has appointed Ireland and Kenya to co-facilitate the negotiations, to agree a new set of global development goals for adoption at a Summit of world leaders in New York in September 2015.  Ireland’s role will be led by the Ambassador to the United Nations, David Donoghue.

Welcoming the appointment, Minister Flanagan said:

“This major appointment is a huge honour for our country, and a great responsibility.  It is testament to Ireland’s standing internationally, to our proud record of promoting human rights, to our long-standing participation in peacekeeping across the world and to our diplomacy.  It is a recognition of the effectiveness of the Irish Aid programme managed by the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade.  It underscores the Government’s commitment that the fight to end poverty and hunger will remain firmly at the core of Ireland’s foreign policy. 

“I discussed the possibility of this appointment during my recent visit to the UN in New York and made it clear that the Irish Government would be strongly supportive.  This significant new role will build on Ireland’s important work on international development during our EU Presidency in 2013, and on the MDGs at the United Nations.  I know that Ambassador Donoghue and his team will take on the challenge with great commitment, and they will have the strong support of the Department and Ireland’s entire diplomatic network”.

Minister Sherlock said:

“The role we have been given is pivotal in addressing the ambitious challenge to end global poverty and hunger in a generation.  It will require Ireland to work closely with all members of the United Nations to secure a set of new goals which are ambitious and transformative.  We will be defining an agenda for global action to end poverty and hunger and to ensure sustainable development worldwide by 2030”. 

ENDS

Press office

19 October 2014 

Note for Editors

For more about the post 2015 agenda, see :

http://www.un.org/millenniumgoals/beyond2015.shtml 
http://sustainabledevelopment.un.org/index.php?menu=1561

 To participate in the global conversation on Sustainable Development Goals: http://vote.myworld2015.org/