A/HRC/33/45
and promotion of financial support and capacity-building. Japan strongly supported the
2030 Agenda and its human-centred approach, but had questions relating to indicators and
the role of private sector investment. Brazil discussed how the 2030 Agenda had
reinvigorated multilateralism, and reaffirmed the three dimensions of development as
enshrined in the Rio Declaration on Environment and Development of 1992. The Agenda
required the strengthening of international cooperation and the doubling of efforts on the
right to development, to move away from polarization and to achieve consensus. Brazil
enquired about the role of the Working Group in the Agenda. Kenya observed that the right
to development did not always receive the support and attention it deserved by the Human
Rights Council. Bearing in mind the time it would take to negotiate a legally binding
instrument, given current challenges, Kenya asked what could be done to move the right to
development agenda forward. Ecuador raised a question on how the fair distribution of
wealth within countries could be measured.
42.
The United Nations Conference on Trade and Development pointed out its longstanding commitment to and participation in the sessions of the Working Group. Given the
impetus provided by the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, it was important that
the Working Group find a concrete outcome and role within this framework, to also utilize
valuable time and resources.
43.
South Centre emphasized the need for common but differentiated responsibility. It
referred to examples of intellectual property rights, transfer of technology and actions on
climate change where it was not always clear who was responsible for what. Given
differentiated capabilities, there was also a need for differentiated responsibilities. On
measurability, there was also the question regarding both the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable
Development and human rights of whether all components could be measurable as such.
According to Associazione Comunità Papa Giovanni XXIII, the new Agenda had
incorporated the transformative vision of the Declaration on the Right to Development. If
adequately implemented, it would provide new impetus for the realization of the right to
development. A right to development approach to the Sustainable Development Goals
would create positive effects, including the understanding that States have duties to ensure
development as a human right and not as a matter of charity. It referred to the need for
participatory and inclusive monitoring. The global high-level political forum should build
on the work of human rights mechanisms, while the Working Group should also take
charge of the important role it could play. International-Lawyers.Org pointed out that the
process of drafting the Sustainable Development Goals had begun by agreeing on issues of
principle, not the specifics of indicators. It observed that human rights today were often
legal rights. With regard to the 2030 Agenda, the greatest flaws were the tendency to make
unequal things equal, and that not all States or all peoples had the same responsibilities.
44.
In replying to the questions asked, Ambassador Kamau noted that the general
trajectory was a positive one, despite war, conflict and other disasters. The right to
development agenda had to move forward. The world had been moving on, irrespective of
developments in the Working Group. The 2030 Agenda had to be addressed in an
integrated fashion, and not by “cherry picking”. Expectations had to be managed; the
Sustainable Development Goals did not prescribe a particular political or economic model,
but were aimed at reaching agreement on concrete goals and targets. The discussion could
not have started with indicators, and that work had been delegated to a technical group.
There was no need to “reinvent the wheel”; the Working Group should ask itself whether it
really wanted to embark on an exercise of identifying indicators or leave it to a technical
group. All forms of resource mobilization were important, including at the domestic level.
Accountability deficits had to be closed. The common but differentiated responsibilities
were part and parcel of the 2030 Agenda, so this had been settled. Many of the comments
were acknowledged. Ambassador Kamau reiterated the need to search for the common
good. In this regard, the 2030 Agenda had set a high bar, and there was enough ambition
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