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

“It is imperative to put an immediate end to continued and evolving nuclear weapons-sharing arrangements and extended deterrence that in fact is a new nuclear-arms race,” Indonesia’s delegate, speaking on behalf of the Non-Aligned Movement, told the First Committee (Disarmament and International Security) today, in its thematic debate on nuclear weapons.

While artificial intelligence (AI) and other innovations hold endless promise for driving prosperity and growth, the international community must urgently address the critical and widening digital gap between developed and developing countries, senior United Nations officials and Member States told the Second Committee (Economic and Financial) today as it took up information and communications technologies (ICTs) for sustainable development as well as globalization and interdependence.

Inclusion and equal participation in systems that provide law and justice — for all individuals at the national level and all States at the international one — is crucial to upholding the rule of law, speakers stressed in the Sixth Committee (Legal) today, as it concluded its debate on that principle against the backdrop of a challenging geopolitical context.

The Security Council today authorized the renewal for one year the sanctions regime on Haiti, continuing a travel ban and asset freeze, and expanding the scope of an arms embargo as well as the designation criteria for those measures initially established in October 2022 and later renewed in October 2023 to quell rampant gang violence and restore security in the crisis-torn nation.

This week, the United Nations Organization Stabilization Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (MONUSCO), in its continuing support to the Government on demobilization, disarmament, and reintegration of ex-combatants, repatriated four ex-combatants from Rwanda along with a dependent woman.

Major world Powers all tacitly agree to allow starvation to be a geopolitical weapon, an independent expert told the Third Committee (Social, Humanitarian and Cultural) today, citing conflict as the leading driver of hunger and malnutrition, as materialized in the looming famine in Gaza.

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

The present era is witnessing an unprecedented threat to peace, accompanied by a weakening and, in some instances, a loss of the very concept of peace itself, the Holy See’s delegate told the First Committee, which concluded its general debate today.

Along with visits from the President of the General Assembly and the Deputy Secretary-General, Sixth Committee delegates took up the Secretary-General’s report, “Strengthening and Coordinating Rule of Law Activities” today, as speakers discussed the rule of law at the national and international levels, with some underscoring the importance of equal participation and access to justice and others offering national best practices in tackling corruption and ensuring transparency.