Meetings Coverage

The Secretary-General of the upcoming Fourth United Nations Conference on the Least Developed Countries today praised those nations for showing “their ownership and leadership” in submitting a comprehensive, ambitious and forward-looking draft programme of action to be adopted at the May event.

Welcoming the genuine contribution of the International Organization of la Francophonie to United Nations efforts in countries like Haiti, Côte d’Ivoire and Democratic Republic of the Congo, the General Assembly today invited the Secretaries General of those international bodies to continue exchanging information with a view to identifying new areas of cooperation.

Praising the appointment of Somalia’s new Cabinet in the Security Council today, the Secretary-General’s Special Representative in the strife-torn country called for international support to help its Transitional Federal Government consolidate the gains of the Djibouti Peace Agreement as the end of the transition period approached.

With the United Nations Mission in Nepal (UNMIN) set to end its four-year mandate in the Himalayan country tomorrow at midnight, the Security Council reaffirmed its support for the peace process and called on the Nepalese caretaker Government and all political parties to “redouble their efforts to continue to work together in the sprit of consensus to fulfil the commitments they made in the Comprehensive Peace Agreement and other agreements”.

Amid widespread concern that more of the world’s poorest nations had not graduated to the next stage of socio-economic development in the last 10 years, officials from developing countries pressed today for the fulfilment of development assistance pledges, reform of trade policies and the transfer of technology, while urging the United Nations to help devise specially tailored strategies to help ease the transition to prosperity.

The upcoming Fourth United Nations Conference on the Least Developed Countries, which would determine the development paradigm for years to come, must come up with concrete ways to achieve sustainable economic prosperity in those 48 nations and improve the lot of their millions of poor people, the Secretary-General of the Conference said at the opening session of its Intergovernmental Preparatory Meeting.

The Fifth Committee (Administrative and Budgetary) today wrapped up the main part of a sixty-fifth session that aimed to boost the Organization’s efficiency by overhauling how tens of thousands of staff around the globe are hired, trained and paid, while continuing to modernize its outdated information and communications technology system.

Wrapping up the main part of the sixty-fifth session, General Assembly President Joseph Deiss (Switzerland) hailed the “constructive and cooperative spirit” that had prevailed over three months of critical, and at times challenging, deliberations on a range of issues, from poverty eradication and human rights to sustainable development and disarmament.

Expressing serious concern at continued fighting and condemning terrorist attacks by armed groups and foreign fighters, the Security Council today extended its authorization of the African Union Mission in Somalia (AMISOM) until 30 September 2011. Unanimously adopting resolution 1964 (2010) under Chapter VII of the United Nations Charter, the Council requested the African Union to increase AMISOM’s force strength from the current mandated level of 8,000 troops to a maximum of 12,000.