The action plan signed last week by the United Nations and the Government of Myanmar to end the recruitment and use of child soldiers by that country’s armed forces promised to set the war-torn nation’s children on the right path, the Organization’s senior official on the rights of children in armed conflict said today at a Headquarters press conference.
In progress at UNHQ
Press Conference
With donors slashing development aid due to the global economic crisis, the United Nations is proposing international taxes and other innovative financing mechanisms to raise more than $400 billion annually to meet global priorities like fighting climate change and meeting the Millennium Development Goals, according to the Organization’s annual global development report, released at Headquarters today.
With the crises in Syria and Mali, a broad reassessment of peacebuilding schedules and many peacekeeping mandates coming to term, July looks very busy for the Security Council, the Permanent Representative of Colombia, which will hold the 15‑member body’s rotating presidency for that month, said today.
Global labour leaders unveiled at Headquarters today a comprehensive, multipronged strategy aimed at tackling the global youth unemployment crisis, which has already put 75 million young people worldwide on the unemployment line and forced more than 200 million to work for less than $2 a day.
The high-level segment of this year’s Economic and Social Council substantive session will focus on productive capacity, employment, decent work and development cooperation, the President of that main United Nations organ said at a Headquarters press conference today.
Fashion design and production could provide a major platform for sustainable development in Africa, the Secretary-General’s Millennium Development Goals Advocate said today at a Headquarters press conference to introduce Fashion 4 Development, an initiative created with the aim of mobilizing the industry to support attainment of the targets.
While illicit drug consumption had stabilized among developed and middle-income countries, it had risen among developing countries — especially in West Asia and West Africa — where trafficking routes were generating local demand, and an integrated, balanced response was the only way to address such threats, Yury Fedotov, Executive Director of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), told journalists at a Headquarters press conference today.
The success of a new United Nations strategy against the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) would depend on the willingness of all the actors to support and implement the proposed actions, correspondents were told today at a Headquarters press conference on the potential impact of the initiative.
Louise Mushikiwabo, Rwanda’s Minister of Foreign Affairs, today strongly denied allegations that her Government was supporting mutineers in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, declaring there was nothing to gain by such an action on Kigali’s part.
Eight “Centres of Excellence” were being created around the world to help countries mitigate the risks related to chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear (CBRN) material, notably by promoting coherent national and regional policies that allowed them to better share information and best practices, four technical experts said today at a Headquarters press briefing.