Intensified humanitarian commitments were needed as the situation in Côte d’Ivoire and neighbouring Liberia continued to deteriorate, top United Nations officials said at a Headquarters press conference today. “The humanitarian crisis in Côte d’Ivoire is very serious and it is getting worse,” said Ndolamb Ngokwey, Deputy Special Representative of the Secretary-General in the West African nation.

The Secretary-General, during his visit to Guatemala, this morning inaugurated a monument in memory of the Guatemalans who lost their lives while serving in United Nations peacekeeping missions. He will also meet with civil society representatives and visit the International Commission against Impunity in Guatemala.

The Secretary-General strongly condemns the use of live ammunition today by the security forces of Yemen against demonstrators in Sana’a, which has reportedly left more than 30 people killed and many seriously injured. He reminds the Government of Yemen that it has an obligation to protect civilians.

The Security Council will hold consultations on Libya at 3 p.m. today. As of 19 March, the United Nations refugee agency (UNHCR) and the International Organization for Migration (IOM) estimate that at least 320,000 people have fled Libya, while nearly 9,000 remain stranded at the borders with Tunisia and Egypt.

The Contact Group on Piracy off the Coast of Somalia has agreed on the urgent need to adopt a comprehensive approach to combating the scourge and its causes, the Permanent Representative of Turkey, Chairperson of the Group, told correspondents this afternoon.

The Secretary-General is in Tunis where he is expected to tell civil society groups that he has come to show solidarity at this historic time, to listen to the concerns of the people and to offer United Nations help. Earlier today, he heard from the leadership about Tunisia’s map for its democratic transition.

The Secretary-General strongly condemns today’s bomb attack near a bus stop in West Jerusalem, which has reportedly killed one woman and injured over 30 Israeli civilians, some of them seriously. Such attacks are unacceptable. He calls for an immediate cessation of such acts of terrorism and violence against civilians.

The Secretary-General will be delivering his mandated seven-day report on the implementation of resolution 1973 (2011) regarding Libya to the Security Council this afternoon at 3 p.m. And that will be an open meeting, to be followed by consultations at approximately 4:40 p.m. He will go to the Security Council stakeout to brief correspondents on the meeting and on his recent trip to the Middle East and North Africa.

The transatlantic slave trade was a tragedy of immense proportions that had inflicted untold suffering on millions of people for more than four centuries, a crime against humanity that deserved solemn — and prominent — recognition at United Nations Headquarters, “lest we forget”, said Raymond Wolfe, Jamaica’s Ambassador to the United Nations, at a press conference today in New York.

The Secretary-General convened a high-level meeting this morning of senior officials of UN agencies, funds and programmes to take stock of the international response to the latest developments resulting from the situation at Japan’s Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, which has given rise to calls to reassess the international emergency response framework and the nuclear safety regime. The Secretary-General supports these calls.