Speakers in the Fifth Committee (Administrative and Budgetary) today welcomed a 5.2 per cent reduction in the projected cost of replacing semi‑permanent office blocks at the United Nations Office at Nairobi that date back to the 1970s, but expressed concern that a seismic mitigation retrofit and life‑cycle replacements project at the Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP) premises in Bangkok is running the risk of going over budget.
Gravely concerned over escalation of violence on the Gaza border and settlement activity in the West Bank, the United Nations Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process told the Security Council today that the international community could no longer allow prospects for a two‑State solution to slip away.
Millions of people risk being left behind due to the impact of rapid technological change, the General Assembly heard today as speakers called for increased cooperation to harness the positive and transformative power of technology to improve the livelihood of people around the world.
Protection of diplomatic and consular representatives — as well as the security and inviolability of diplomatic and consular missions, their archives, documents and communications — is one of the pillars upon which international relations rests, speakers stressed while voicing concern at rising attacks on missions and personnel around the world, as the Sixth Committee (Legal) took up the matter today.
The recent “shocking” case of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi is only one of thousands of enforced disappearances and the international community must stand firm in denouncing such crimes, the Third Committee (Social, Humanitarian and Cultural) heard today as it continued its debate on human rights.
Exchanging views on ways to break a languishing disarmament impasse, including by assuring all non‑nuclear‑weapon States against the use or threat of atomic bombs, delegates of the First Committee (Disarmament and International Security) today began a thematic discussion on nuclear weapons.
The Secretary-General’s Special Envoy for Syria, briefing the Security Council today on efforts to push forward a constitutional committee aimed at ending the eight-year-long conflict in Syria, also announced his decision to step down at the end of November, while vowing to vigorously pursue a balanced, fair and inclusive political solution “until the last hour” of his tenure.
A shift in States’ legal obligations when countering terrorism, the negative impacts of unilateral coercive measures and the right to development were among the many topics experts covered in briefings to the Third Committee (Social, Humanitarian and Cultural) today, as delegates engaged with them in lively interactive dialogues.
The International Residual Mechanism for Criminal Tribunals is essential to ensuring that the legacies of the Former Yugoslavia and Rwanda Tribunals endure, the General Assembly heard today, as speakers considered the Mechanism’s first year as a “stand‑alone institution”.
Taking action on decolonization issues today, the Fourth Committee (Special Political and Decolonization) approved 19 draft resolutions, five of them by recorded vote, for adoption by the General Assembly.
