Meetings Coverage

At a General Assembly meeting today on implementation of the 2001 Declaration of Commitment on HIV/AIDS and the follow-up Political Declaration of 2006, United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon spoke of progress in the world’s AIDS response, citing heightened commitment, better prevention, improved treatment and more strategic use of funding, but stressed that, with about five new infections occurring for every two people on treatment, “now is not the time to falter”.

The Special Committee on Decolonization this afternoon approved a draft resolution calling upon the Government of the United States to expedite a process that would allow the Puerto Rican people to exercise fully their inalienable right to self-determination and independence.

The Chairman of the Security Council Committee set up under resolution 1737 (2006) to monitor implementation of sanctions and measures imposed on Iran by resolutions 1737 (2006), 1747 (2007) and 1803 (2008), presented the tenth quarterly report to the Council, covering the period from 11 March to 15 June.

The nearly 16-year United Nations Observer Mission in Georgia (UNOMIG) was ended this evening, when a draft resolution that would have extended its mandate for just two weeks to allow divergent views to coalesce around a new security regime in the region, failed to pass, owing to a veto exercised by the Russian Federation.

“We need to heed the call of our conscience, recognize that our interests are bound together, and act ‑‑ united ‑‑ with the urgency the times demand,” United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said today, as he opened a day-long forum on global health, in which representatives of Governments, United Nations agencies, the private sector and civil society explored ways to improve national health systems and maximize the impact of global health interventions.

The Security Council today condemned in the strongest terms the 25 May nuclear test by the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, and tightened sanctions against it by blocking funding for nuclear, missile and proliferation activities through targeted sanctions on additional goods, persons and entities, widening the ban on arms imports-exports, and calling on Member States to inspect and destroy all banned cargo to and from that country, if they have reasonable grounds to suspect a violation.

John Holmes, Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator, briefed the Security Council today on his recent trip to the Sudan, acknowledging the recent efforts of the Government to work more closely with humanitarian workers in north and south Sudan, but saying the situation in the south was of major concern, and a full return of humanitarian capability was still needed in Darfur.

Seven years after the civil war, the people of Sierra Leone wanted to see and feel the dividends of peace, said Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon today, at an unprecedented high-level special session of the Peacebuilding Commission, which launched a Multi-Donor Trust Fund for Sierra Leone and rallied international support around the Government’s unified development strategy.

Representatives of non-governmental organizations, as well as students and others attending today’s United Nations Public Forum in Support of the Palestinian People, discussed ways in which civil society could promote greater solidarity with the Palestinian people, and how they could join forces in backing a peaceful settlement of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, while stressing that a two-State solution was the only way.

The General Assembly this morning elected Ali Abdussalam Treki, a three-time Permanent Representative of Libya to the United Nations and former Foreign Minister, as President of its sixty-fourth session.