Despite an eleven-year stalemate in the Disarmament Commission over ways to achieve nuclear disarmament and wide scepticism that confidence-building measures in the field of conventional arms would also remain elusive, hope remained for achieving consensus on each item of that body’s painstakingly agreed agenda, said Sergio Duarte, High Representative for Disarmament Affairs as he opened the Commission’s 2011 substantive session.

While it was still very difficult to know how long it will take for conflict in Libya to be resolved, the responsibility for finding a solution lay with the Libyan people themselves, the Secretary-General’s Special Envoy, Abdul Ilah al-Khatib, told the Security Council today during a briefing on his second mission to the country and other recent events there.

Following are UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s remarks, as prepared for delivery, to the Global Colloquium of University Presidents, “Empowering Women to Change the World”, in Philadelphia, 4 April:

Concrete action towards the goal of complete nuclear disarmament, while guaranteeing the right to the peaceful use of nuclear energy, was urgently needed — both to ensure a safer world and to prove the value of the “struggling” Disarmament Commission, whose reputation had been tarnished by years of inaction, delegates said today, as they wrapped up the general debate of its 2011 substantive session.

Following are UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s remarks at a wreath-laying ceremony in New York, 6 April:

Seventeen years ago, in 1994, in the space of three months, an estimated 800,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus were killed in Rwanda, in what came to be known as the Rwanda genocide. In observance of the seventeenth anniversary of the Rwanda genocide, a commemoration will take place in the Economic and Social Council Chamber at United Nations Headquarters, on Thursday, 7 April, from 5 to 6 p.m.

Following are Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s remarks to the Security Council meeting on Haiti, in New York on 6 April:

Following are UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s remarks to a panel discussion on “Solving the Autism Public Health Puzzle: Regional and International Collaboration”, in New York, 6 April:

Recognizing the interconnected nature of earthquake-devastated Haiti’s long-term recovery and development challenges and expressing concern for the most vulnerable groups of Haitian society, the Security Council today called on the international community to continue supporting Haitian authorities strengthen core governance structures and ensure that vulnerable people had access to basic social services, justice and protection.

In a brief organizational meeting today, the United Nations Disarmament Commission elected Knut Langeland (Norway) as Chair of its Working Group I, dedicated to “recommendations for achieving the objective of nuclear disarmament and non-proliferation of nuclear weapons”.