benefit of language incentives. He recalled that the resolution in question had authorized the Secretary-General to grant exceptions to the general principle that promotion should be conditional upon confirmed knowledge of a second language. At its twenty-seventh and twenty-eighth sessions, the Secretary-General had advised the General Assembly that it had not been possible to apply that principle rigidly. The Secretary-General had pointed out, however, that the percentage of promotions of staff with a second language had risen from 31 per cent in 1968 to 40.5 per cent in 1973. In 1974, the Fifth Committee had stated in its report on the item that, in special cases, the Secretary-General could continue to apply the resolution flexibly, and that was what the Secretary-General had been doing since that time. 2. The representative of Argentina had asked whether the Secretary-General agreed with the view of one of his predecessors that improving the language training services was preferable to the introduction of a language incentive, and what the Secretariat thought of the view of the majority in ICSC that the incentive was an anomaly, was not achieving its objective and was being restrictively applied. The statement to which the ICSC report referred had been made in 1968 by the then Secretary-General, in commenting on the conclusions of the International Civil Service Advisory Board. The Secretary-General had said that the Board's conclusions merited careful consideration but finally he had proposed both the strengthening of language training arrangements and the introduction of the current language incentive. The term "anomaly" implied a value judgement to which it was difficult to respond. It was true that the incentive was applied in only one organization, but it was the largest in the common system and the one where the political vision of Member States converged. Currently, the percentage of 
**Analysis**
The text appears to be discussing the administrative and organizational aspects of the United Nations, specifically the language incentives and training services for staff. It mentions the Secretary-General, the General Assembly, and the International Civil Service Advisory Board, indicating a focus on the internal workings of the UN organization.

**Category**
Education, Employment