Meetings Coverage

As the Sixth Committee began its deliberations on the status of the Protocols Additional to the Geneva Conventions of 1949, and relating to the protection of victims of armed conflicts, delegates expressed grave concerns about the accountability of Member States and urged greater compliance to all provisions in the Conventions and Additional Protocols.

After the 2015 target year for realizing the Millennium Development Goals, global policymakers should consider replacing the current economic categories of countries by classifying them in a manner more appropriately reflecting their socio-economic situations and challenges, the Minister for Foreign Affairs of Bangladesh told the Second Committee (Economic and Financial) today.

Joining forces to reduce nuclear arsenals, keeping promises, declaring zones free of nuclear weapons, stemming proliferation, abandoning the rationale for nuclear weapons retention and abolishing them were among the calls to action in five draft resolutions tabled today as the First Committee (Disarmament and International Security) concluded its thematic debate on nuclear weapons.

Noting with deep concern the increase in violence and rising inter-tribal fighting in Darfur, the Security Council this afternoon extended the mandate of the Panel of Experts that monitors the arms embargo and sanctions on those who impede peace in Sudan, for one year, ending 19 October 2011.

The Special Representative of the Secretary-General on Sexual Violence in Conflict told a Security Council meeting this afternoon that the body must seize the opportunity provided by the arrests of perpetrators of recent mass rapes in the Democratic Republic of the Congo to “begin turning the tide of impunity”. “The arrests must serve as a warning to perpetrators of sexual violence everywhere,” Margot Wallström said as she briefed the Council.

The Security Council today extended the mandate of the United Nations Stabilization Mission in Haiti (MINUSTAH) until 15 October 2011, with the intention of further renewal. Unanimously adopting resolution 1944 (2010), the Council decided to maintain current Mission force levels and called on the Secretary-General to conduct a comprehensive assessment of the security environment following the election and transfer of power to a new Government in 2011.

The political impasse in Nepal remained, the Under-Secretary-General for Political Affairs told the Security Council today, and despite continued efforts towards achieving the objectives of the caretaker Government and the Unified Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist) (UCPN-M), no breakthrough had been achieved.

The Security Council must remain united in its support for the timely holding of the referendum in South Sudan and ensure compliance with all agreements concerning the region, leaders of the Security Council’s 4 to 10 October mission to Sudan and Uganda affirmed in a public briefing in the Council Chamber today.

Delegations in the Fourth Committee (Special Political and Decolonization), before concluding their consideration of the peaceful uses of outer space, weighed the strength of existing international space law to prevent the militarization of outer space and to respond to other current challenges, such as the use of nuclear power sources in outer space and the threat of space debris.