Meetings Coverage

It was long past time for the Security Council to act with “courage and conviction” by adopting measures to ensure that those responsible for grave atrocities in Darfur were brought to justice sooner rather than later, the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court told the 15-member body today, as she presented her latest report on the conflict-ridden region in Sudan.

Emphasizing the importance of credible, fact-based, independent assessments, analysis, and recommendations, the Security Council this morning extended until 9 July 2014 the mandate of the Panel of Experts appointed by the Secretary-General in 2010 to assist the Committee that monitors implementation of the sanctions regime on Iran.

States parties to the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination elected nine members to the Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination today, replacing colleagues whose four-year terms are set to expire on 19 January 2014.

The first ever international treaty to regulate the trade of conventional weapons “opened a door of hope” to millions of people living in deprivation and fear because of the poorly controlled trade and the proliferation of those deadly weapons, the United Nations top official said today as the instrument opened for signature, with more than 60 delegates lining up to pen their names.

In a call to action, the Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues approved a draft decision today recommending that the Economic and Social Council rename it as the “Permanent Forum on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples”, at the close of a two-week session marked by a dynamic effort to preserve those peoples’ identity, ensure their rights and secure a fully fledged place on the global stage.

The international community’s attention to indigenous peoples appears to be waning, and, after 12 years of existence, the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues might be experiencing “fatigue”, the expert body heard today as it wrapped up its substantive work on the penultimate day of its twelfth session.

States Parties to the International Convention on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members of Their Families today elected by secret ballot seven members to the Committee that monitors the treaty’s implementation, to replace those whose four-year terms will expire on 31 December.

As it considered the situation in the Central African subregion today, the Security Council reiterated its strong condemnation of the attacks and atrocities, as well as violations of international humanitarian law and abuses of human rights, being perpetrated by the Lord’s Resistance Army, and called for an immediate end to the violence.

The Security Council today extended the mandate of the United Nations Interim Security Force for Abyei (UNISFA) until 30 November, deciding further to increase the 4,200-strong troop presence in the contested border town to 5,326 peacekeepers, as requested by Sudan and South Sudan on 8 March, through the Joint Political and Security Mechanism.

Including indigenous peoples in shaping the post-2015 development agenda and in closing persistent gaps in the current scheme was crucial, so that when the time came, the global community could “hit the ground running”, the Permanent Forum heard today during a panel discussion in which top United Nations policy advisers sketched plans for the much-anticipated follow-on proposal.