The Third Committee (Social, Humanitarian and Cultural) concluded its debate on social development today, with delegates drawing attention to the world’s lack of preparedness for COVID-19, a challenge that has exacerbated inequalities between and within countries, raising human rights concerns.
The Fourth Committee (Special Political and Decolonization) approved today its work programme for the seventy‑fifth session of the General Assembly, covering the decolonization of the 17 remaining Non-Self-Governing Territories, peacekeeping operations, the plight of Palestine refugees and Israel’s practices affecting the human rights of Palestinians and other Arabs in the occupied territories, among several agenda items.
The Fifth Committee (Administrative and Budgetary) today approved a draft resolution that would let three of the four Member States now behind in their contributions to the United Nations budget keep voting in the General Assembly until the end of its seventy-fifth session.
The Third Committee (Social, Humanitarian and Cultural) continued its debate on social development today, with delegates highlighting the ways in which COVID-19 has exposed and exacerbated entrenched inequalities and calling for universal distribution of a vaccine, once available, at affordable prices.
As the Sixth Committee (Legal) continued its debate on measures to eliminate international terrorism, speakers grappled with the amorphous nature of the global threat, highlighting how — absent a comprehensive international convention — defining and then taking appropriate measures to combat the phenomenon, which continues to defy categorization, remained challenging.
The COVID‑19 pandemic has aggravated the challenges of fighting international terrorism, exacerbating conditions conducive to the threat and increasing the climate of misinformation and distrust, the Sixth Committee (Legal) heard today as it took up the Secretary‑General’s report on the subject and approved its work programme for the seventy‑fifth General Assembly session.
With COVID‑19 becoming the biggest challenge the global community has faced since the Second World War and the founding of the United Nations 75 years ago, delegates stressed the need to bolster international cooperation in combating its devastating effects, as the Second Committee continued its general debate today.
The First Committee (Disarmament and International Security), opening its seventy-fifth session today, approved a programme of work, timetable and plans for virtual meetings, given current restrictions at Headquarters related to the COVID‑19 pandemic.
Beyond a global health crisis, COVID-19 has created an economic and humanitarian emergency, pushing those least able to adapt into even more vulnerable positions, the President of the General Assembly told the Third Committee (Social, Humanitarian and Cultural) today, as he laid out what is at stake after years of gains made in social development.
The devastating effects of the COVID-19 pandemic continue to hamper vulnerable States, slowing or reversing economic growth and sustainable development, speakers told the Second Committee (Economic and Financial) as it began its general debate today with a keynote address by Joseph Stiglitz, Nobel laureate in economics and University Professor at Columbia University.
