Meetings Coverage

Despite ongoing clashes and shifting front lines, the five-month-old war between Government and opposition forces in Libya had basically stalled behind the posturing of both sides, and a ceasefire tied to transitional arrangements was still the only sustainable political solution to the crisis, the Security Council heard today.

The head of United Nations peacekeeping operations reported to the Security Council today that the initial rollout of the newly authorized security force for Abyei was under way, with some 500 Ethiopian troops headed to the disputed area straddling Northern and Southern Sudan, the flashpoint for recent violence between the two sides.

Pressure mounted today for a way to be found to open a passage in the long-deadlocked Conference on Disarmament that would engage members in negotiations on such matters as a ban on fissile material for nuclear weapons, as the General Assembly held a follow-up to last year’s high-level meeting on revitalizing that body.

The Palestinian people had completed their two-year state-building programme, fulfilling a substantial part of their “contract” with the United Nations, and it was now time for the international community to uphold its end of the deal so that they would see the Organization admit their viable and independent State during the General Assembly’s sixty-sixth session, Riyad Mansour, Permanent Observer for Palestine, told the Palestinian Rights Committee today.

The Security Council held a discussion today with the military commanders of key United Nations peacekeeping operations in Africa and the Middle East, who highlighted their strategies for overcoming the challenges they faced in unpredictable settings impacted by everything from sporadic armed conflict and unfriendly local populations, to lingering political tensions, long–term humanitarian needs and inclement weather.

Determining that the situation in Côte d’Ivoire remained a threat to international peace and security in the region, the Security Council decided today to extend until 31 July 2012 the mandate of the United Nations peacekeeping mission in the West African country. Unanimously adopting resolution 2000 (2011), the 15-nation body also decided to maintain the strength of the United Nations Operation in Côte d’Ivoire (UNOCI) at 9,792 military troops, 1,350 police officers and 8 customs officers.

While some strides had been made to increase access to safe drinking water and adequate sanitation — now regarded as a fundamental human right — efforts must be redoubled to provide access to safe water to the more than 1 billion people without it and basic sanitation services for the more than 2 billion still in need, urged experts and delegates in the General Assembly this afternoon.

Senior Government officials at a special session of the General Assembly today called on Member States, with the support of the United Nations, to take action to enable young people to overcome widespread unemployment and other problems and to ensure that they participated integrally in global efforts for peace and sustainable development.

Without a credible path out of the profound, persistent deadlock in the Middle East peace process, coupled with far-reaching steps on the ground, theviability of the two-State solution and the Palestinian Authority’s state-building agenda was in jeopardy, the Secretary-General’s Personal Representative warned today.

With young people leading the charge for social change around the world, reinvigorated investments in youth were more critical than ever before, said United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon today as he opened a High-level Meeting referred to, by one young delegate from Egypt, as a sort of “international Tahrir Square”.