While the responsibility to protect rests with national Governments, the international community has a duty to act when States themselves are the culprits of ethnic cleansing, are unable to prevent genocide or cannot ensure accountability for war crimes, delegates told General Assembly today.
The Special Committee on Decolonization today approved a draft resolution reiterating that the only way to end the special and particular colonial situation of the Falkland Islands (Malvinas) is through a peaceful and negotiated settlement of the sovereignty dispute between Argentina and the United Kingdom.
A total of 23 donors today announced contributions, or their intention to contribute, to the 2019 budget of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) after two young Palestinian students told the General Assembly Ad Hoc Committee how critical funding was making a deep, lasting and positive impact on the lives of millions of children like them.
The General Assembly today unanimously adopted an oral decision deciding to immediately continue informal intergovernmental negotiations on Security Council reform during its seventy-fourth session.
Noting with concern the way in which political insubordination impedes Puerto Rico’s ability to tackle its serious economic and social problems, the Special Committee on Decolonization approved a draft resolution today that calls once again upon the United States to shoulder its responsibility to facilitate the realization of the right of Puerto Ricans to self‑determination.
The General Assembly, acting without a vote, adopted three resolutions today, including one through which it will recognize 21 June as the International Day of the Celebration of the Solstice.
Opening the substantive portion of its 2019 session today, the Special Committee on Decolonization took up the questions of Gibraltar, Tokelau and Western Sahara, while also approving draft resolutions relating to the dissemination of information about its work and its dispatching of visiting missions to the world’s 17 remaining Non‑Self‑Governing Territories.
The General Assembly today elected 19 members of the Economic and Social Council, while also deciding to commemorate the seventy-fifth anniversary of the signing of the United Nations Charter on 26 June 2020, and to convene a high-level meeting marking the anniversary later that year.
In two rounds of voting today, the General Assembly elected Estonia, Niger, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Tunisia and Viet Nam as non-permanent members of the Security Council for two-year terms spanning 2020-2021.
The General Assembly, acting by acclamation today, elected Tijjani Muhammad Bande (Nigeria) today as President of its seventy-fourth session, as well as 20 Vice-Presidents.
