The following Security Council press statement was issued today by Council President Elbio Rosselli (Uruguay):

Following is UN Secretary-General António Guterres’ statement on the first anniversary of the World Humanitarian Summit, in New York today:

Initial findings from the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) fact-finding mission in Syria had found evidence of sulfur mustard in samples taken from an alleged attack on 16 September 2016, while analysis of samples collected in relation to an alleged April incident in Khan Shaykhoun had revealed exposure to sarin or a sarin-like substance, the United Nations disarmament chief reported today.

As New York Headquarters observes the International Day of United Nations Peacekeepers on Wednesday, 24 May, Secretary-General António Guterres will lay a wreath to honour all fallen peacekeepers and preside over a ceremony for the posthumous award of the Dag Hammarskjöld Medal to 117 military, police and civilian personnel who lost their lives while serving in peacekeeping operations during 2016.

The new Permanent Representative of Uzbekistan to the United Nations, Bakhtiyor Ibragimov, presented his credentials to UN Secretary-General António Guterres today.

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

With the liberation of Mosul imminent, the international community must maintain a dual focus on defeating the remaining Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL/Da’esh) forces in Iraq, and on working towards post-conflict security and reconstruction, the Secretary-General’s Special Representative said in a briefing to the Security Council today.

Resuming its 2017 session, the Committee on Non-Governmental Organizations today recommended 47 groups for special consultative status with the United Nations Economic and Social Council, and deferred action on the status of 15 others.

The members of the Security Council strongly condemned the most recent ballistic missile launch conducted by the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea on 21 May 2017.  The members of the Security Council expressed their utmost concern over the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea’s highly destabilizing behaviour and flagrant and provocative defiance of the Security Council by conducting this ballistic missile launch in violation of its international obligations under United Nations Security Council resolutions 1718 (2006), 1874 (2009), 2087 (2013), 2094 (2013), 2270 (2016) and 2321 (2016).

United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres arrived in Mont Pélerin, Switzerland, from Strasbourg, France, on 17 May, to attend the two-day annual seminar of his Representatives and Envoys.