General Assembly: Meetings Coverage

The twenty-first century was “proving to be a century of people on the move”, and innovative approaches were needed to address new patterns of forced displacement, the Third Committee (Social, Humanitarian, Cultural) was told today by the head of the United Nations refugee agency.

As the Sixth Committee today continued its annual consideration of the International Law Commission report, delegates tackled, among others, the complex topic of “immunity of State officials from foreign criminal jurisdiction”, seeking to clarify the balance between the need to ensure stability in international relations and to avoid impunity from grave crimes.

Major developments in urbanization since the Second United Nations Conference on Housing and Sustainable Urban Development (Habitat II) made a strong case for holding a third meeting, Joan Clos, Executive Director of the United Nations Human Settlements Programme (UN-Habitat), told the Second Committee (Economic and Financial) as it began considering that agency’s work today.

The Fifth Committee (Administrative and Budgetary) today considered the Secretariat’s request for more than 26 new posts and $8 million in new resources to maintain the overhaul of the Organization’s system of administering justice begun more than two years ago. If approved by the General Assembly, the additional resources would kick in on the first of January along with the upcoming 2012-2013 budget cycle.

In the wake of the near-meltdown at Japan’s Fukushima Daiichi power plant that had “changed the landscape” of nuclear safety, General Assembly delegates today said the incident was a grave reminder of the need to close existing safety gaps in the world’s nuclear programmes.

Now facing its third year with a “down to the wire at the last minute” funding gap for essential services, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) was still $46 million short for its 2011 budget, the Fourth Committee (Special Political and Decolonization) heard today as it began its annual consideration of that Agency’s work.

The Sixth Committee (Legal) today turned its focus from the second group of topics within the International Law Commission report to the third group, and heard from Special Rapporteurs on the “expulsion of aliens” and the “protection of persons in the event of disasters” that the development of international legal instruments on these matters was both timely and relevant.

The planet would suffer irreversible damage if “business as usual” continued, Sha Zukang, Under-Secretary-General for Economic and Social Affairs warned today as the Second Committee (Economic and Financial) began its consideration of sustainable development.

In a late diplomatic development today in the Disarmament Committee, a key sponsor of a draft resolution that would have had the General Assembly call upon the Conference on Disarmament to set a programme of work during its 2012 session to enable the immediate start of negotiations, did not press that text to a vote, in order, he said, to “preserve the integrity and strength” of the proposal.

Cooperatives — member-driven business enterprises that put people front and centre — offered a viable and vibrant alternative economic model, General Assembly delegates said this afternoon, as the United Nations launched the 2012 International Year of Cooperatives.