General Assembly: Meetings Coverage

Reaffirming the need to strengthen the synergy between Africa’s economic and social development programmes on the one hand, and its peace and security agenda on the other, the General Assembly today adopted a resolution that stressed the critical importance of a regional approach to conflict prevention on that continent.

Vowing to break the world’s paralysis in the face of mass atrocities typified by the Holocaust, the Khmer Rouge killing fields and the Rwanda genocide, delegates in the General Assembly grappled today with how -– and whether -– to implement the responsibility to protect (R2P) doctrine, during a half-day informal interactive dialogue.

Denmark had established strong institutional mechanisms, including a Minister for Gender Equality and a complaints board, to protect women’s rights in the labour market and curb domestic violence and human trafficking for sexual exploitation, the Deputy Permanent Secretary of Denmark’s Department for Gender Equality told the Committee monitoring State parties’ compliance with the Women’s Convention today.

Spain had made sweeping moves to empower and legally protect women since Prime Minister Jose Luis Zapatero took office in 2004, including enactment of laws to erase gender inequality and gender-based violence, as well as action plans to help the country’s most socially and economically vulnerable women gain access to health care, education, employment and housing, Spain’s first ever Minister of Equality, Bibiana Aido Almagro, said this afternoon.

Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon this morning urged Member States to help save humanity from genocide and other massive human rights abuses as he opened a General Assembly special session on the subject of the responsibility to protect, which will continue with a thematic interactive dialogue and general debate on Thursday, 23 July.

This year, the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women should seize the opportunity of the thirtieth anniversary of the women’s rights Convention and the tenth anniversary of its Optional Protocol to raise their visibility and strengthen their impact for the sake of women worldwide, with the ultimate aim of getting more States to ratify both instruments and withdraw any reservations to them, Naela Gabr, Committee Chair said this morning.

The First Committee (Disarmament and International Security), in its last meeting of the current session, met this morning to fill the remaining vacancies on its Bureau for the upcoming sixty-fourth session of the General Assembly. The Committee elected by acclamation Hossam Aly ( Egypt), Hilario G. Davide, Jr. (Philippines), Florian Laudi (Germany) as Vice-Chairmen, and Tetyana Pokhval’ona (Ukraine) as Rapporteur for the Assembly session.

United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon this afternoon spelled out five key ways to help post-conflict countries achieve sustainable peace more rapidly and effectively, as he addressed the Peacebuilding Commission’s third session.

The General Assembly today endorsed the outcome of the Conference on the World Financial and Economic Crisis and Its Impact on Development, which, among other things, outlined the need for sustained follow-up within the United Nations system to the issues raised during that historic meeting held from 24 to 30 June.

The General Assembly this morning unanimously confirmed Supachai Panitchpakdi of Thailand for a second four-year term as Secretary-General of the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD). Acting on a proposal by United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, the Assembly appointed Mr. Supachai to head UNCTAD for a term beginning on 1 September 2009 and ending on 31 August 2013.