As delivered by Deputy Chief of Mission Gary Robbins
to the Permanent Council, Vienna
April 3, 2014
The United States would like to inform the Permanent Council that it was admitted as a Candidate Country of the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI) on March 19. The United States is joining a group of now 44 countries – including nine OSCE participating States and one Partner for Cooperation, from Albania, to Norway, to Afghanistan – all working actively to improve the management of their oil, gas, and mining sectors. In joining EITI, the United States, like all EITI countries, is committing to work hand-in-hand with civil society and with company representatives to strengthen accountability and enhance citizens’ access to information about the revenue generated by the extraction of our nation’s natural resources.
The 2012 Dublin Declaration on Good Governance recognized the value of EITI as an important benchmark of transparency among participating States. The 2013 Ukrainian Chairmanship, representing another recently admitted Candidate Country, did an outstanding job of furthering our discussions on EITI last year. We look forward to additional conversations on how the OSCE can leverage EITI and its principles in pursuit of our collective efforts to promote good governance and transparency.
We are particularly proud that in admitting the United States, the EITI Board highlighted the openness and transparency demonstrated during the preparation of our application. Joining EITI is in line with our belief that the platform it provides for open debate and dialogue is valuable for countries in all regions and at all levels of development – not only for the prevention of corruption, but to ensure citizens can hold governments accountable for responsible management of these sectors. We would welcome the opportunity to share our experiences so far with other OSCE countries and also to learn from those who are already EITI members.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
