Full version (shortened during delivery)

Excellences, Co-facilitators,

I have the honour to deliver this statement on behalf of the EU and its Member States.

Candidate Countries Türkiye, North Macedonia, Montenegro, Serbia, Albania, Ukraine, the Republic of Moldova and Bosnia and Herzegovina, the potential candidate country Georgia, as well as Andorra, and Monaco align themselves with this statement.

Science, technology, innovation, and - most recently - digitalisation, have become THE crucial enablers of progress towards the Sustainable Development Goals, and of leaving no one behind. And yet, despite their enormous potential, technology and the digital revolution carry significant risks. We must forge ahead, but we must also address those risks.   

The Pact for the Future must therefore underline the specific steps we need to collectively take to deliver just, green and digital transitions, all while promoting prosperity, resilience, innovation, competitiveness, and economic and social wellbeing, based on human rights, for current and future generations.

The EU and its Member States are ready to work with all partners, including civil society, academia, the private sector, as well as the technical community. We welcome the co-facilitators’ multi-stakeholder approach to both the Pact and the Global Digital Compact. An inclusive process is absolutely necessary - a true precondition - to achieving real and sustainable results.

[Digital Cooperation, with focus on GDC]

I will first focus on EU expectations for a Global Digital Compact, annexed to the Pact for the Future. We insist on the political importance of the GDC and its potential to accelerate the progress towards the SDGs, and recall that no hierarchy may be established between the Pact and the Compact. The links between Chapter 3 and the GDC must be clear, avoiding duplications, and Chapter 3 must include a concise reference to the annexed GDC. The STI section and the GDC can and should be mutually reinforcing..

An effective and meaningful Global Digital Compact will support an internet that is open, accessible, neutral, free, inclusive, global, interoperable, reliable, secure and environmentally sustainable. It must reaffirm the multi-stakeholder model of digital governance. The EU strongly supports the Internet Governance Forum as the premier independent forum for multistakeholder input for internet governance.

We are committed to contributing to global connectivity and digital access for all, in the framework of the twin - digital and green - transition. We expect the Pact to prioritise global connectivity and enhanced capacity building as essential steps to closing the digital divides. In order to ensure digital inclusion, we will keep promoting equal and meaningful access to digital tools and the development and training of digital skills. Digital technologies, including ICTs, and digital commons should be leveraged as important enablers of the SDGs. The promotion of digital humanities and digital humanism is essential in this context.

The digital transformation must be human-centric and human-rights based, directed towards progress in implementing the Agenda 2030. Human rights, fundamental freedoms and human dignity must be promoted, protected and fulfilled online as well as offline. We must establish appropriate safeguards and define responsibilities for platforms and search engines. In the EU, we have taken steps to ensure that online platforms live up to their responsibility for the content they display, including disinformation.

In particular, all women and girls must have full and meaningful access to digital education to overcome the gender digital divide. They must also be protected from technology-facilitated gender-based violence. The Compact should prioritise global efforts to ensure new technologies significantly contribute to gender equality, whilst preventing, mitigating and managing all potential harmful impacts resulting from the development and use of digital technologies. It should also include prevention and protection of children and young people from online harm.

This approach also needs to be applied to Artificial Intelligence and other new and emerging technologies, and must encompass both public authorities and private companies. Trust, transparency and accountability are crucial. In order to contribute to sustainable development, AI must be ethical and responsible, in conformity with the UNESCO Recommendations on the Ethics of AI. We call for a human rights-based approach to the design, development, deployment, evaluation and use of technologies, to prevent and eradicate discrimination, stereotypes and biases. This includes due diligence practices and human rights safeguards. Social and economic challenges that might emerge from the development of AI and other new technologies must also be addressed. This could include development of policies that mitigate such risks, prevent harm and promote technologies which augment human capabilities, ensuring that AI complements rather than replaces human labour. The recently adopted EU AI Act goes in that direction.

Above all, we expect the Global Digital Compact to reflect real UN added-value: the UN is uniquely placed to convene stakeholders and enhance cooperation and dialogue between public authorities, online platforms, academia, media, the technical community, and civil society. The global nature of UN instruments should also help enhance information integrity online and address the risks of information manipulation and interference, while safeguarding human rights and fundamental freedoms. The UNESCO Guidelines for the governance of digital platforms and the proposed Global Code of Conduct for Information Integrity on Digital Platforms are such examples.

We also commit to promoting and supporting resilient digital public infrastructures, digital commons and digital public goods as important enablers of the SDGs.

[Science, Technology & Innovation]

Scientific cooperation worldwide can only thrive in an open, fair and inclusive environment. It is essential to make research data as accessible, interoperable, and reusable as possible. The protection and enforcement of intellectual property rights not only allows but encourages and enhances, by creating the necessary trust and incentives, the transfer, promotion and dissemination of technological innovation at the global level, in a manner conducive to social and economic welfare.

Scientific research thrives thanks to academic freedom of thought and expression. It is and should remain anchored in evidence rather than being dictated by political authority. At the same time, STI can inadvertently cause unexpected or dangerous side-effects, and technological breakthroughs may impact fundamental human rights, which underlines the need for the highest ethical standards and a human-rights based approach.

The Pact must thus ensure that technologies are designed, developed and used in a way that fully promotes, protects and fulfils human rights and fundamental freedoms, as well as the rule of law.

Let’s not forget our education systems, which must provide opportunities for all, to leave no one behind, including all children. They must promote gender equality, the empowerment of all women and girls, as well as youth. Girls’ lack of access to science education, and the insufficient number of women in leadership positions, restrict the emergence of transformative and inclusive science and technology.

Finally, general trust in the digital and technological ecosystem, and in public institutions, needs to be increased. This can be achieved by enhancing accountability, transparency and human rights.

Thank you.