Meetings Coverage

While welcoming Mongolia’s efforts to bring its national legislation into line with its obligations under international treaties, members of the Human Rights Committee expressed considerable concern today that an absence of judicial independence jeopardized broader protections by eroding public faith in the most fundamental mechanisms of justice.

Mongolia had announced a moratorium on the death penalty in the last 10 years, in addition to having enacted a landmark gender equality law and streamlined procedures for registering non-governmental organizations with the State in order to improve their overall efficiency, the Human Rights Council heard today as it took up that country’s fifth periodic report.

As the General Assembly today considered the recent progress reports of the two key bodies of the United Nations peacebuilding architecture, delegates gave generally favourable reviews of their track records in responding to the needs and challenges on the ground of strife-torn and post-conflict countries.

Citing critical gaps between a number of admittedly excellent laws and proposed legislative amendments on the one hand, and the actual status of civil and political rights in Serbia on the other, experts of the Human Rights Committee pressed that country today to do more on several fronts, including the protection of minority rights, the effective functioning of its courts and grave instances of violence against journalists and human rights defenders.

Demanding an immediate ceasefire in Libya, including an end to the current attacks against civilians, which it said might constitute “crimes against humanity”, the Security Council this evening imposed a ban on all flights in the country’s airspace — a no-fly zone — and tightened sanctions on the Qadhafi regime and its supporters.

The Secretary-General’s Special Representative for Afghanistan called for full international support to the planned transition to Afghan responsibility for security, governance and development in the troubled country as he addressed the Security Council this morning during a debate on that situation.

In order to facilitate what it called urgently needed humanitarian assistance in Somalia, the Security Council decided this morning to ease its assets freeze on the beleaguered Horn of Africa nation for 16 months.

While Serbia had made gains in reforming its judiciary, advancing minority participation in public affairs and generally fostering a “spirit of tolerance and inter-cultural dialogue”, the Government was aware of the challenges it faced in advancing civil and political rights, especially given the enduring legacy of conflict in the region, top officials told the Human Rights Committee today as its experts considered the country’s second periodic report.

Following protests across the Occupied Palestinian Territory in recent weeks, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas had announced his intention to establish a unity Government and to conduct elections within six months, said a representative of Palestine at United Nations Headquarters today.

With the election process gearing up and refugees flooding in from neighbouring Côte d’Ivoire, the increasingly complex situation in Liberia required sustained international attention, even though progress continued, Ellen Margrethe Løj, Special Representative of the Secretary-General, said today in a briefing to the Security Council.