Security Council: Meetings Coverage

The Security Council must continue to improve its openness to non-Council-Member States, temporary members and the general public while ensuring its ability to act effectively and efficiently, speakers said in a day-long debate on the body’s working methods, in its chambers today.

The Security Council today emphasized the critical importance of post-conflict peacebuilding as the “foundation for building sustainable peace and development in the aftermath of conflict”, and highlighted the need for effective peacebuilding strategies to ensure durable peace and development.

While the international community had recently intensified efforts to revive Israeli-Palestinian negotiations, the top United Nations political official today warned the Security Council that the situation on the ground “remains fragile and a crisis of confidence between the parties has so far prevented the resumption of talks”. “We cannot afford to lose this opportunity to reach an agreement,” said B. Lynn Pascoe, Under-Secretary-General for Political Affairs, as he briefed the Council.

The sustainability of the peace process in the Democratic Republic of the Congo would depend on the success of the efforts to stimulate recovery and reconstruction and to ensure the effective presence and authority of the State, as well as consolidation of democratic structures, the Head of the United Nations Mission in that country told the Security Council today.

Plans were on track for an Iraqi mechanism to replace the fund that funnels the country’s export revenues towards development needs and international obligations, the United Nations Controller told the Security Council this morning.

Regional support for renewed Middle East peace efforts was now urgently needed, as was continued strong consensus among international partners and an end to the creation of “negative facts” on the ground, Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon told the Security Council today.

While improvements in Sierra Leone’s political climate were seen as inching the country towards eventual sustainable development, senior United Nations officials warned the Security Council today that the magnitude and political significance of youth unemployment posed a latent risk of instability in the West African nation struggling to consolidate peace and stimulate development.

The Security Council today extended the mandate of the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) until 23 March 2011, realigning it to assist the Government in the transition to national leadership of the country’s recovery efforts, including by supporting the preparations for the conference to be held in Kabul later this year.

Condemning the continued flow of weapons that it said violated its arms embargoes on Somalia and Eritrea, the Security Council this afternoon extended for 12 months the mandate of the group monitoring those measures, expanding its mandate and giving it three additional experts.

Expressing grave concern over trafficking in small arms and light weapons, particularly in Central Africa, the Security Council today encouraged States in that subregion to join forces in order fully to implement measures to curb the illicit trade and to create mechanisms and regional networks for sharing information on the circulation and trafficking of weapons.