General Assembly: Meetings Coverage

The Fifth Committee (Administrative and Budgetary) today considered the Secretary-General’s appeal for $775.3 million to fund more than three dozen special political missions in 2024 as several delegates again pushed for the creation of a special financing mechanism to sustain them. While supportive of the missions’ crucial part in the Organization’s global peace and security pillar, delegates voiced their concern that the 39 missions consume a quarter of the Organization’s regular budget.

Pressing challenges like climate change and armed conflict cannot be overcome if half of the world’s population does not enjoy equal rights and opportunities, the Third Committee (Social, Humanitarian and Cultural) heard today, as it commenced its debate on the advancement of women.

The threats and ravages of climate change are inextricably linked to national and global progress on the Sustainable Development Goals, requiring urgent action in the environmental, financial and energy sectors, speakers stressed today as the Second Committee (Economic Financial) continued its annual general debate.

As the Sixth Committee (Legal) continued its debate on measures to eliminate international terrorism today, delegates detailed national, regional and worldwide efforts to combat the constantly evolving scourge in the absence of both an internationally agreed-upon definition and a comprehensive convention.

Representatives and petitioners from French Polynesia, New Caledonia, Guam and the British Virgin Islands took the floor today as the Fourth Committee (Special Political and Decolonization) began considering in closer detail the situations in the 17 Non-Self-Governing Territories.

As they gauged ongoing efforts to run an ethical and accountable Organization, delegates in the Fifth Committee (Administrative and Budgetary) today stressed the need for an independent Office of Internal Oversight Services (OIOS), the oversight body that carries out internal audits, investigations and evaluations of the Organization’s resources and staff.

The risk of nuclear weapons use is real and it is crystal clear that as long as they exist, the world will never be a safer place, the First Committee (Disarmament and International Security) heard today, as it continued its wide-ranging general debate.

The Fourth Committee (Special Political and Decolonization) began its general debate on decolonization and related items today, with many speakers emphasizing the need to resolve the questions of the 17 Non-Self-Governing Territories, more than six decades after the General Assembly adopted the Declaration on the Granting of Independence to Colonial Countries and Peoples.

Convening its first meeting of the seventy-eighth session today, the Sixth Committee (Legal) took up the Secretary-General’s report on measures to eliminate international terrorism, with delegates investigating the scourge’s emerging trends and underscoring both the importance of agreeing on a legal definition and developing a comprehensive convention on combating the menace.

As developing States face compounding crises of onerous debt, extreme poverty and the costs of climate change, “business as usual is not viable” in steering the dangerously off-track Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) back towards progress, speakers warned today as the Second Committee (Economic and Financial) opened its annual general debate.