Covering 30 per cent of the earth’s land surface and providing critical food security, energy and livelihoods for some 1.6 billion people, forests were intimately linked to the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and their responsible management crucial to humanity’s future, speakers underlined today, as the United Nations Forum on Forests opened its twelfth session.
The Fifth Committee (Administrative and Budgetary) today opened the second part of its resumed seventy-first session, when it was expected to focus on $7.97 billion in budget requirements requested for United Nations peacekeeping operations for the 2017/18 fiscal period.
The absence of communication with the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, especially military-to-military channels, was dangerous, the Secretary-General warned the Security Council today, emphasizing the need to lower the risk of miscalculation or misunderstanding.
The Security Council decided this afternoon to extend the mandate of the United Nations Mission for the Referendum in Western Sahara (MINURSO) until 30 April 2018.
The very survival of indigenous peoples depended on States taking swift action to rapidly recognize and respect all human rights, the Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues heard today, concluding the first week of its sixteenth session.
Condemning the latest attacks on civilians in Syria today, the United Nations humanitarian chief told the Security Council that real progress was needed to “stymie the tide of death” in that country.
The General Assembly today adopted the United Nations Strategic Plan for Forests 2017-2030, a wide-reaching six-point framework aimed at halting deforestation and forest degradation, while also designating 21 April “World Creativity and Innovation Day”.
The empowerment of indigenous women as powerful agents of change could only strengthen their communities and nations in the face of environmental and other challenges, the Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues heard today.
Calls demanding respect for traditional lands, resources, knowledge and cultures rang through the Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues today, with participants from the North Pole to New Zealand pressing Governments to move beyond “paper promises” and uphold their rights.
Against a backdrop of spiking extremism, proliferating “fake news” and an increasingly fragmented global media space, the Department of Public Information must continue to disseminate factual, impartial information, in accordance with the United Nations Charter principles of sovereignty and non-interference in the internal affairs of States, speakers stressed today, as the Committee on Public Information continued its annual session.
