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STU/5BE/13/022
18 March 2013

UNESCO-STU and Staff Representatives from more than 29 staff associations and unions met for over a week to participate in the 66th Session of the FICSA Council. This year the Council was hosted by the Africa Regional Office of the World Health Organization in Brazzaville (Congo).

STU – UNESCO is one of the founders and a full voting member of FICSA. It is at the FICSA Council that priorities are set by the FICSA members and that clear and distinct directives are given to the FICSA Executive Committee as to how best it can represent their interests at the high level inter-agency meetings such as the Fifth Committee of the United Nations General Assembly, International Civil Service Commission (ICSC), the HR Network, the High Level Committee on Management (HLCM), the Chief Executives Board (CEB; the Inter Agency Security Management Network (IASMN) and in the various task forces and working groups.

Much time was dedicated to discussions in plenary and in the various standing committees – Legal Questions, Human Resources Management, Staff Management Relation, Social Security/Occupational Safety and Health, GS Questions, Professional Salaries and Allowances, and Conditions of Service in the Field – on topics related to the conditions of service for staff at headquarters duty stations as well as those in the field offices.

Guests included Mr Kingston P Rhodes, Chairman of the International Civil Service Commission (ICSC), who underscored the importance of working with FICSA along with other staff representative bodies at formal sessions of the Commission as well as other bodies. He told participants that their contributions during the past year on various joint working groups established by the Commission such as the Pensionable Remuneration scales, the review of Standards of Conduct for the International Civil service, the bi-annual review of duty stations and others are essential to the advancement of undertakings steered by the Commission.