General Assembly

Jarmo Viinanen, Permanent Representative of Finland to the United Nations, was elected Chair of the First Committee (Disarmament and International Security) on 22 June 2010.

Hernán Salinas Burgos, Director of Legal Affairs in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Chile, was elected Chair of the Sixth Committee (Legal) on 22 June 2011.

Abulkalam Abdul Momen, Permanent Representative of Bangladesh to the United Nations, was elected Chair of the Second Committee (Economic and Financial) on 22 June 2011.

Haniff Hussein, Permanent Representative of Malaysia to the United Nations, was elected Chair of the Third Committee (Social, Humanitarian and Cultural) on 22 June 2010.

Nassir Abdulaziz al-Nasser was elected President of the sixty-sixth session of the United Nations General Assembly on 22 June 2011. A veteran diplomat, Mr. Al-Nasser has contributed to advancing the multilateral agenda in the realms of peace and security, sustainable development and South-South cooperation over a career spanning nearly four decades.

The General Assembly’s incoming President, in his first Headquarters press conference this afternoon, said the sixty-sixth session would focus on the priority theme of mediation.

“Achieving the realization of the rights of persons with disabilities is more than possible, it is within reach and it is a necessity,” the Chair of the Conference of States Parties to the Convention on the Rights of Person with Disabilities declared today. As the Conference concluded its three-day fourth session, Chair Mårten Grunditz of Sweden emphasized that all the world’s people would “lose out” if the rights of persons with disabilities were not realized.

By raising the voices of persons with disabilities to the highest levels of Government and decision-making, their participation in political and public life — a critical human right in itself — also formed the bedrock for many other rights, participants in the Fourth Conference of States Parties to the Rights of Persons with Disabilities said today.

In the past year, the General Assembly had made important contributions to the mobilization of support for the Millennium Development Goals, the green economy and sustainable development, as well as the role of the United Nations in global governance, Joseph Deiss (Switzerland), outgoing Assembly President, said at his final Headquarters press conference today.

Deputy Secretary-General Asha-Rose Migiro today urged delegates from Governments and civil society to build on the early success of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities by promoting the issue beyond the walls of the United Nations and telling the world that disabled people could make enormous contributions to progress.