Press Release

The wide-ranging efforts of the United Nations to better communicate with the world public will be reviewed in the thirty-second annual session of the Committee on Information, taking place at Headquarters from 26 April to 7 May. During the two-week session, delegations will review the activities of the Department of Public Information and its three subprogrammes -- Strategic Communications, News Services and Outreach Services -– in the period July 2009 to February 2010.

A package of projects to help Somalia and its neighbours prosecute maritime piracy suspects was approved today by a 10-nation board overseeing a new United Nations trust fund for the fight against piracy. The announcement was made at United Nations Headquarters by B. Lynn Pascoe, Under-Secretary-General for Political Affairs, who chairs the Board of the Trust Fund to Support Initiatives of States Countering Piracy off the Coast of Somalia.

Her Majesty Queen Rania Al Abdullah of Jordan will visit United Nations Headquarters on 27 April to launch a new children’s book on cross-cultural understanding. The book, entitled "The Sandwich Swap", is a warm-hearted fable about friendship and tolerance across cultural lines. The story is based on an anecdote Her Majesty tells and which encapsulates, in today’s troubled times, the need for global understanding.

Following are UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s remarks on Earth Day, in New York, 22 April:

The thirtieth Ministerial Meeting of the United Nations Standing Advisory Committee on Security Questions in Central Africa will take place in Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of the Congo, from 26 to 30 April.

The following statement was issued today by the Spokesperson for UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon in observance of the twenty-fourth anniversary of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster, 26 April:

On 22 April 2010, the Security Council Al-Qaida and Taliban Sanctions Committee approved the addition of the two entries specified 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.

Following is the text of Deputy Secretary-General Asha-Rose Migiro’s remarks at the launch of INSPIRA, today, 22 April, in New York

Following is the text of Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s video message for United Nations Business for the Environment Global Summit, in Seoul, Republic of Korea, today, 22 April

On 22 April 2010, the Security Council Al-Qaida and Taliban Sanctions Committee approved the deletion (de-listing) of the entry specified below from its Consolidated List. The Committee approved this de-listing following its review of the name, as called for in paragraph 25 of Security Council resolution 1822 (2008). The assets freeze, travel ban and arms embargo set out in paragraph 1 of Security Council resolution 1904 (2009) therefore no longer apply to the following individual: