Meetings Coverage

The Committee on Non-Governmental Organizations today suspended its 2010 resumed session when it ran out of time to complete consideration of its report; it agreed to ask the Committee on Conferences for additional meeting time in order to wrap up its business for the year.

After yet another attempt to organize national elections in Côte d’Ivoire had come up short, the main Ivorian political factions were sticking to their “core interests”, the top United Nations official there told the Security Council today, as he warned that competing priorities over the oft-postponed ballot, reunification and citizen identification had left the divided country at a “complex […] delicate impasse”.

Acknowledging that the production of reliable, timely statistics and indicators of countries’ progress were indispensable for informed policy decisions and monitoring implementation of the Millennium Development Goals, the General Assembly this afternoon decided to designate 20 October as World Statistics Day.

The Committee on Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) today recommended sevenentities for consultative status with the Economic and Social Council, postponed its consideration of 32 applications, and closed three others. It also suspended 77 organizations which failed to complete reporting requirements, and one more on the basis of a written complaint by the delegation of Turkey.

Meeting this morning to consider a vacancy on the International Criminal Court of Justice, the Security Council set 9 September 2010 as the date for the election to fill it.

The Committee on Non-Governmental Organizations today took note of the quadrennial reports of 220 non-governmental organizations in consultative status and deferred consideration of the reports of 21 more, owing to insufficient information.

The Committee on Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) today recommended 5 entities for consultative status with the Economic and Social Council and postponed its consideration of 43 applications.

In the early morning hours of Tuesday, the Security Council expressed deep regret at the loss of life and injuries resulting from the use of force during the Israeli military operation early on Monday in international waters against the convoy sailing to Gaza, and condemned those acts which had killed at least 10 civilians and wounded many more.

Adopting its provisional final report by acclamation today, the Review Conference for the landmark 1995 Fish Stocks Agreement determined that implementation of the accord would be further strengthened by additional recommendations that built on outcomes adopted in 2006 and addressed, in some cases, new issues relevant to strengthening the substance and methods of implementation.

Extending the mandate of the United Nations Organization Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (MONUC) until 30 June 2010 today, the Security Council also decided that from 1 July it would bear the title “United Nations Organization Stabilization Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (MONUSCO)”, in view of the new phase reached in the country.