Briefing the Security Council on a range of priorities today, Special Envoy for Syria Geir Pedersen detailed efforts to build trust among warring parties, facilitate the creation of a constitutional committee and clarify the fate of persons missing since the start of the conflict, now in its eighth year.
As the Committee on Information entered the second day of its forty-first session today, speakers took opposing stances on the Special Information Programme on the Question of Palestine — which the Department of Global Communications oversees — while also spotlighting the potential negative impact of fake news on international relations.
The United Nations Interim Security Force for Abyei (UNISFA) remains essential to the stability of the border regions between Sudan and South Sudan, the Organization’s Peacekeeping chief told the Security Council today, proposing the creation of a civilian unit to support progress towards political resolution of the dispute and requesting a six-month extension of its mandate.
Harnessing the power of taxation to help nations realize sustainable growth and development requires inclusive, innovative approaches based on developing countries’ needs and aimed at leaving no one behind, delegates told the Economic and Social Council today during its one‑day annual meeting on international cooperation in tax matters.
The General Assembly today held a multi-stakeholder hearing as part of the preparatory process for its high-level meeting on universal health coverage, addressing the theme of “moving together to build a healthier world”.
The newly named Department of Global Communications is instilling a culture of collaboration and innovation and undertaking measures to create broader public engagement needed to tackle global challenges, the Under-Secretary-General for Global Communications told the Committee on Information today as it opened its forty-first session.
Civil society leaders briefing the Security Council today described a deepening crisis in the Occupied Palestinian Territory characterized by political mistrust, economic challenges and environmental degradation while calling upon authorities in the Middle East to harness new green technologies as a tool for peace.
The Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues today heard myriad challenges these communities face in pursuing the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, as well as calls for indigenous peoples’ inclusion at the highest level of decision-making by granting them Observer Status in the General Assembly.
With the successful inclusion of indigenous peoples’ concerns in the major global frameworks, the priority now is to translate these aspirations into concrete improvements, the Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues heard today in its fourth day of discussions.
Amid flaring tensions in eastern Ukraine, delegates in the Security Council today urged all parties to the conflict — now in its fifth year — to avoid unilateral actions that could exacerbate tensions, and to uphold their commitments, under the Minsk Protocol agreements to bring peace to the region’s 3.5 million beleaguered people in need of humanitarian assistance.
