First Committee of the UN General Assembly holds press conference on cyberwarfare, with Russian and Iranian objections
Dominated by representatives of Middle Eastern member states, the latest press conference held by the Disarmament and International Security Committee sought to clarify the work on the drafting of the resolution on “Cyberwarfare as a threat to international security”.
Al-Jazeera
Confronted with questions about issues not fully addressed by the Committee, representatives from Iran, Lebanon and Saudi Arabia manifested the will to encourage the development of rules and norms of international law to regulate the responsibility of UN member states on cyber-related issues. The press instigated the Committee to address cyberespionage as well, given that the draft text, up to the moment of the conference, did not strongly condemn the misuse of information and communications technology (ICT) conducted by some member states to inappropriately obtain information from other states.
According to the representatives, the Committee is likely to adopt a resolution — either by consensus or by a recorded vote — in spite of the frequent exchange of accusations between delegates in the past sessions. Even though a few representatives have declared indisposition to adopt a resolution on the topic, those part of the press conference have guaranteed that they are employing their efforts in support of a common understanding, considering that the current topic affects all member states.
In a few moments, the Committee should enter the action phase, in which the draft text will be altered collectively until it does not have opposition from any state, or until the controversial paragraphs have been reduced to the minimum, allowing for the approval of the resolution by a recorded vote. This outcome, although not ideal, has become more probable with a joint declaration by the representatives of Iran and Russia, which declared to not have had their needs and statements concerning cybersecurity understood by some of their counterparts, and accused most of them “incapable of having a more broader view of the international relations”. Read the full text below:
“In our view, this committee is clearly being used as a means of imposing solutions which do not fit the reality on our countries”
“Both the Islamic Republic of Iran and the Russian Federation feel in need to turn public their concerns regarding the Disarmament and Security Committee. It is clear that most of the representations which took part on the debate since Wednesday are totally incapable of having a more broader view of the international relations, creating by their own hands a group on the margin of world’s status quo establishment. In our view, this committee is clearly being used as a means of imposing solutions which do not fit the reality on our countries. Our needs and statements concerning cybersecurity seem to not have been understood by some delegates in this meeting, once they keep concerning about economic losses while some of us have to deal with attacks towards their nuclear facilities.
We hope the discussion can get to more reasonable grounds. Surely we are here to debate and help finding solutions, but once more, the solutions may consider the position of each part of the discussion, regarding all the different views about complex subjects it implies.”
