¹ú²úAV

UNAT considered appeals from both Mr Schoone and the Secretary-General. UNAT held that, for the reasons set forth in judgment Nos. 2013-UNAT-357 (Malmstrom et al. ), 2013-UNAT-358 (Longone) and 2013-UNAT-359 (Ademagic et al. ), the delegation of authority granted to the ICTY Registrar could not be construed so as to grant him the authority to convert staff members’ fixed-term appointments into permanent appointments. UNAT recalled that in those three cases it had held that the decision-making authority to grant permanent appointments was properly vested in the Assistant Secretary-General for...

The Tribunal, referring to O’Hanlon, (which was not before the UNDT), stated that, “This Tribunal interpreted the Inter-Organisation Agreement Concerning Transfer, Secondment or Loan of Staff Among the Organisations Applying the United Nations Common System of Salaries and Allowances to require that service in the releasing Organisation will be counted as service in the receiving Organisation. The Inter-Organisation Agreement interpreted that O’Hanlon was remarkably similar to Article 5. 1 of the IAMA, which pertains to service credits for staff who transfer under the IAMA. Under the rationale...

UNAT considered an appeal by the Secretary-General and an appeal Ademagic et al. UNAT held that judgment No. 2013-UNAT-357 applied mutatis mutandis and adopted paragraphs 33-82 of that judgment, summarised as follows: UNAT held that UNDT erred in law in finding that the authority to grant permanent appointments to to International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) staff members vested in the ICTY Registrar and, accordingly, vacated the UNDT decision on that basis and upheld the Secretary-General’s appeal on that issue; UNAT held that each candidate for permanent appointment...

UNAT considered an appeal by the Secretary-General and an appeal by Mr. Longone. UNAT held that judgment No. 2013-UNAT-357 applied mutatis mutandis and adopted paragraphs 33-82 of that judgment, summarised as follows: UNAT held that UNDT erred in law in finding that the authority to grant permanent appointments to International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) staff members was vested in the ICTY Registrar and, accordingly, vacated the UNDT decision on that basis and upheld the Secretary-General’s appeal on that issue; UNAT held that each candidate for permanent appointment...

UNAT held that the ASG/OHRM, and not the ICTY Registrar, had discretionary authority in matters of permanent appointment. UNAT held that the ASG/OHRM had failed to exercise her discretion in a lawful manner in adopting a blanket policy of denial of permanent appointments to ICTY staff members rather than affording them the individual consideration to which they were entitled. Finding that the staff members were discriminated against and the impugned decision was legally void, UNAT rescinded the impugned decisions and remanded the matter to the ASG/OHRM for consideration of retroactive...

UNAT rejected UNDT’s finding and held that, pursuant to the Inter-Organisation Agreement (which states that service in the releasing Organisation will be counted as service in the receiving Organisation), the staff member’s service with UNRWA should have been counted as service with the UN and that he thus met the service criterion for eligibility. UNAT upheld the appeal and remanded the case to the Administration to decide whether the staff member met the remaining criteria for conversion to a permanent appointment.

UNAT acknowledged that while the Appellant was eligible for a permanent appointment, the Administration was entitled to have regard to the fact that she was recruited because she was a national of Romania for the specific post in UNIC Bucharest. UNAT noted that both the Department of Public Information and the Officer-in-Charge of Human Resources Services previously anticipated that UNIC Bucharest, among others, was scheduled to close in the very near future, due to the uncertainty of the funding by the host country, on which the continuation of the Appellant’s post depended. UNAT noted that...

The Appellant filed a notice of withdrawal pursuant to the terms and conditions of a settlement agreement. UNAT issued Order No. 188 (2014) noting the withdrawal and ordering the Registrar to close the case.

UNAT considered an appeal by the Secretary-General. UNAT held that UNDT did not properly review the impugned administrative decision to determine whether the Administration had given full and fair consideration to staff members’ suitability for conversion. UNAT held that the Administration had fully complied with Section 1 of ST/SGB/2009/10 and paragraph 5 of the Guidelines, as it must when considering whether a staff member is eligible for conversion. UNAT held that UNDT had made a significant error of law in concluding that the impugned decision was unlawful. UNAT held that UNDT had erred in...

UNAT addressed both appeals by the Secretary-General in judgment No. 2014-UNAT-418. UNAT held that UNDT did not commit an error of law when it accepted one of the possible reasonable interpretations of Staff Rule 5.3(e) and decided that the SLWOP did not affect the continuous duration of the staff member’s appointment. UNAT held that, contrary to the assertions made by the Secretary-General, the staff member had in fact an expectation of being granted a permanent appointment and that the evidence had been produced at the special hearing on 4 March 2013. UNAT dismissed the appeals and affirmed...