Meetings Coverage

The stabilization process in Haiti had hit a number of difficulties — including a missed opportunity to hold elections last year — but the Caribbean nation could still surmount entrenched political divisions and launch institutional reforms vital for meeting the urgent security and economic needs of its citizens, a senior United Nations official told the Security Council today.

The Security Council today extended for another year the United Nations Mission in Afghanistan and called on the Organization and the international community to bolster the Afghan Government’s efforts to take ownership of and leadership in National Priority Programmes covering security, governance, justice and socio-economic development.

With a multi-billion-dollar trade in conventional weapons still threatening the lives of millions of civilians around the world, the time had come for States to overcome past setbacks and deliver on a robust, legally binding arms trade treaty, Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon told a packed room at Headquarters as the Final United Nations Conference on the Arms Trade Treaty kicked off this morning.

Ending all violence against women and girls “must be a priority, not an option” for achieving human rights, social cohesion and sustainable development, declared the Commission on the Status of Women this evening, capping its fifty-seventh annual session with the adoption of a set of much-anticipated agreed conclusions that outlined a strong global framework for prevention and response.

The Chair of the Special Committee on Peacekeeping Operations today urged delegations to identify solutions and “a way forward to conclude our work”, as she adjourned the meeting until “not later than 28 March of this year”.

Immediate measures were needed to mitigate the United Nations Headquarters’ vulnerabilities to future flooding events, delegates warned in the Fifth Committee (Administrative and Budgetary) today, as they discussed the costs incurred by the Organization in the aftermath of storm Sandy.

The Security Council today extended for 12 months the mandate of the United Nations Support Mission in Libya to assist the authorities in defining national needs and priorities and match those with offers of strategic and technical advice, and modified the two-year-old ban on arms imports to boost the country’s security and disarmament efforts.

The Commission on the Status of Women wrapped up its general debate today amid calls from civil society groups to focus more substantively on protecting the women and girls whose rights were most often under-represented — or excluded — from the very international human rights instruments intended to protect them.

With Sierra Leone’s progress “proof” of what could be accomplished through concerted multilateral and national efforts in the post-conflict period, it was time to begin a reconfiguration of the United Nations mission and, starting 1 April, to gradually transfer responsibilities to the country team and Government, the Secretary-General’s top envoy in that country told the Security Council today.

United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and General Assembly President Vuk Jeremić joined delegates from around the world today in hailing the late Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez Frías for his strong leadership, commitment to the Millennium Development Goals and advocacy on behalf of the world’s poorest.