The conduct of the referendum in Southern Sudan had been timely, fair, peaceful and credible in a way that no one could have predicted just a few months ago, Benjamin Mkapa, Chair of the Secretary-General’s Panel on the Referenda in the Sudan, said this morning as the Security Council heard briefings on the event, which took place between 9 and 15 January.

The following statement was issued today by the Spokesperson for UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon:

The following statement was issued on 18 January by the Spokesperson for UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon:

United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has appointed Gana Fofang of Cameroon to serve as his Deputy Special Representative in Guinea-Bissau. Mr. Fofang will also serve as United Nations Resident Coordinator and UNDP Resident Representative.

Despite the international community’s recent efforts to resume stalled Israeli-Palestinian peace talks, negotiations were still deadlocked and the goal of reaching a framework agreement on final-status issues remained elusive, B. Lynn Pascoe, Under-Secretary-General for Political Affairs, said today.

On 17 January 2011, the Committee approved the changes specified with strike-through and underline in the entry below to its Consolidated List of individuals and entities subject to the assets freeze, travel ban and arms embargo set out in paragraph 1 of Security Council resolution 1904 (2009) adopted under Chapter VII of the Charter of the United Nations.

Hosted by the Naif Arab University for Security Studies, the conference is the third in a series of workshops undertaken by the United Nations Counter-Terrorism Implementation Task Force (CTITF) through its Working Group on Countering the Use of the Internet for Terrorist Purposes. Previous meetings were held last year in Berlin, Germany, and in Seattle, United States, and explored the legal and the technical aspects of the issue.

Member States must work with all parties in Haiti to help steer the electoral process towards a credible outcome, amid widespread accusations of fraud, so that it did not distract from earthquake-recovery efforts, Alain Le Roy, Under-Secretary-General for Peacekeeping Operations told the Security Council today.

The Government of Malaysia is the first to contribute to the newly established Fellowship Fund created by the United Nations main training vehicle, the United Nations Institute for Training and Research (UNITAR). A symbolic and timely gesture, in support of South-South cooperation, this contribution will ensure access of diplomats from least developed and developing countries to core diplomatic training courses.

Following is the text of UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s remarks to the special debate of the Security Council on post-conflict peacebuilding — institution-building, today, 21 January, in New York: