Meetings Coverage

Strongly criticized today for harbouring negative stereotypes of women and discriminatory attitudes toward immigrants and minorities, Italian officials countered by describing their country’s recent enactment of robust and progressive programmes on both fronts, as the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women took up Italy’s sixth periodic report.

The Republic of South Sudan was admitted as the 193rd Member of the United Nations this morning by a General Assembly resolution adopted by acclamation upon the recommendation of the Security Council. “When we started our journey, we could hardly imagine that the road would lead us to this point, however much we may have hoped for it,” Riek Machar Teny, Vice-President of South Sudan, said as he delivered his country’s first statement to the Assembly.

BUDAPEST, 13 July — As the International Media Seminar on Middle East Peace closed in Budapest, Hungary, today, top Hungarian and United Nations officials urged media creators to reach out to individuals in the region to foster a climate conducive to peace, following two final panels that explored the role of journalism, social media and the arts in that effort.

Despite heavy financial constraints, a largely illiterate population and long-standing customary practices that subordinated women to men, Zambia had achieved a number of legislative milestones this year — the anti-gender-based violence act and the education act among them — and the Government was determined to continue improving women’s standing in a diverse society, officials told the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women today.

The Security Council today recommended to the General Assembly that the Republic of South Sudan be admitted as a Member of the United Nations, adopting resolution 1999 (2011) without a vote. In a statement (S/PRST/2011/14) read out during a formal meeting by Guido Westerwelle, Foreign Minister of Germany, the 15-nation body noted with great satisfaction the Republic of South Sudan’s solemn commitment to uphold the purposes and principles of the Charter and to fulfil all the obligations therein.

Hailing the recent independence of the Republic of South Sudan following decades of civil war, the Security Council today pledged its continued support to the poverty stricken country — which ranks at the bottom of nearly all human development indicators — just moments after recommending to the General Assembly that the world’s newest nation be admitted as a member of the United Nations.

Building on more than a decade of contributions towards a comprehensive framework for protecting children affected by conflict, the Security Council today declared schools and hospitals off limits for both armed groups and military activities, calling for all parties that attacked such facilities to be held accountable and placed on the Secretary-General’s annual list of those committing grave violations against children.

BUDAPEST, 12 July — Welcoming journalists and creators of fiction, theatre and music this morning to a seminar in Budapest, Hungary, on the media’s vital role in resolving the Middle East conflict, the United Nations communications Chief called on them to further utilize their talents to help counter narratives of “fear, hostility and violence” that reified the standstill in the peace process.

Costa Rica’s adoption of a gender-equality policy and the election of its first female President in 2010 were landmark events that would allow women more economic autonomy, political participation and social protection, all of which were essential to overcoming entrenched discriminatory barriers, the country’s delegation said today while presenting its combined fifth and sixth periodic reports to the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women.

The United Nations and its partners sought to ensure that the history of the twenty-first century was the first “not to be written in the blood of innocents”, Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said as the General Assembly convened an interactive thematic debate on the role of regional and subregional arrangements in implementing the responsibility to protect.