On 9 January 2019, the members of the Security Council Committee established pursuant to resolution 1518 (2003) met with Hazim Al-Yousifi, Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs of Iraq, and Mohammed Ali Meften, General Director of the Extradition Office — Commission of Integrity, members of delegation from the Government of Iraq visiting New York from Baghdad who raised three main issues during the meeting:  Namely, recovery of Iraqi financial assets abroad; dealing with delisting requests; and the delisting of Iraqi entities in the 1518 sanctions list.

Without the international community’s support in Libya, spoilers will sabotage the political process and unravel the fragile and easily reversible progress made amid an already grim backdrop of sporadic violence and rising humanitarian needs, the Special Representative of the Secretary-General for the country warned today in a briefing to the Security Council.

The following statement was issued today by the Spokesman for UN Secretary-General António Guterres:

The following statement was issued today by the Spokesman for UN Secretary-General António Guterres:

The Secretary-General is pleased to announce the appointment of Sima Samar and Juan Gabriel Valdés to his High-Level Advisory Board on Mediation.  Ms. Samar and Mr. Valdés succeed Michelle Bachelet and José Manuel Ramos-Horta, to whom the Secretary-General is grateful for their valued expertise during their membership of the Board.

Speakers in the Security Council today debated the future of sanctions imposed on Sudan more than 13 years ago, as the 15-nation body took up the latest report of the Panel of Experts appointed to monitor those measures against individuals and entities obstructing peace in the Darfur region.

Michael Bloomberg, the Secretary-General’s Special Envoy for the Climate Action, today announced the founding members of the Climate Finance Leadership Initiative, who will help facilitate the private financing objectives of the Paris Agreement.

The following Security Council press statement was issued today by Council President José Singer Weisinger (Dominican Republic):

NEW YORK, 16 January (Division for Ocean Affairs and the Law of the Sea) — The resumed twenty-eighth Meeting of States Parties to the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea was held at United Nations Headquarters on 15 January.

Following is United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres’ message, delivered by Christian Salazar, Regional Coordinator for El Salvador to the United Nations, on the occasion of the twenty-seventh anniversary of the signing of the Salvadoran Peace Accords, in San Salvador today: