Meetings Coverage

There would be “no question of Gibraltar being handed over to Spain” — Gibraltar’s Chief Minister told the Special Committee on Decolonization today, as it considered questions of that Non-Self-Governing Territory and of Western Sahara.

Rather than letting cultural differences create divisions, the international community now had the opportunity to integrate cultural traditions into a post-2015 development agenda that would bolster human rights and spur economic growth, speakers said today as the General Assembly held its High-level Thematic Debate on Culture and Development.

The budget review process for the international tribunal for maritime affairs should be brought up to more efficient and effective standards, said delegates today in the Meeting of States Parties to the Convention on the Law of the Sea as it continued its twenty-third session.

“Yemen is in the heart of its transition,” the Secretary-General’s Special Adviser on that country told the Security Council today, while cautioning that there were no guarantees for what lay ahead.

The fact that AIDS was “no longer a certain death sentence” proved that by working together and scaling up urgency and commitment, the international community stood a chance of ridding the world of the epidemic, the representative of the United States said today, as the General Assembly concluded its implementation review of the Declaration of Commitment and the Political Declaration on HIV/AIDS.

The three bodies created to implement the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea — known as the “constitution for the oceans” — were increasingly being called upon to resolve disputes between States and to expand maritime jurisprudence, said delegates today as the Meeting of States Parties to the Convention began its twenty-third annual session.

Meeting in resumed session today, the Special Committee on Decolonization approved three draft resolutions on various aspects of information relating to the Non-Self-Governing Territories under its purview.

The General Assembly today welcomed the Secretary-General’s report on expediting United Nations efforts to bring the global AIDS epidemic fully under control, deciding to include that question as an item on the agenda of its sixty-eighth session.

The Committee on Non-Governmental Organizations met briefly this morning to adopt, as orally revised, the report of its 2013 resumed session, held from 20 to 29 May, during which it recommended to the Economic and Social Council 161 such organizations for consultative status and deferred 219 for further consideration at its regular session in 2014.

The Security Council today welcomed the launch on 3 June of the United Nations Assistance Mission in Somalia, which, the Secretary-General says in his latest report, is a “fresh start” in United Nations engagement in that strife-torn nation, as it is based on a vision underpinned by current needs and opportunities and reinforces the scope for new partnerships and funding requirements.