The first months of 2021 have seen the peace process in Sudan reach a “significant new stage”, with notable reductions in clashes between Government forces and rebel factions in Darfur, the head of that country’s sanctions committee told the Security Council in a videoconference meeting today.
The year 2021 began with “a degree of guarded optimism” for progress towards the settlement of the Israel-Palestine conflict, the United Nations mediator for the Middle East peace told the Security Council today, citing renewed international efforts to broker direct peace negotiations and cooperation between the two sides, including in the fight against the COVID-19 pandemic.
Recent progress towards peace and democracy in Libya has demonstrated that once seemingly insurmountable divisions can be overcome with determined political will, the United Nations top official for that country told the Security Council today, citing the successful launch of the Government of National Unity.
The Security Council expressed its deep concern today at the political and multiple other protracted crises in Haiti, urging stakeholders to set aside their differences and calling upon them to prepare for free, fair, transparent and credible presidential elections later in 2021.
Six months into Afghanistan’s latest round of peace talks, progress remains slow and demands strong support from the global community, the senior United Nations official in the country told the Security Council today, while also sounding alarm about soaring rates of violence that continue to hamper humanitarian efforts and erode public confidence more broadly.
On 23 March 2021, the Security Council Committee pursuant to resolutions 1267 (1999), 1989 (2011) and 2253 (2015) concerning ISIL (Da’esh), Al‑Qaida and associated individuals, groups, undertakings and entities enacted the amendments specified with underline and strikethrough in the entries below on its ISIL (Da’esh) and Al-Qaida Sanctions List of individuals and entities subject to the assets freeze, travel ban and arms embargo set out in paragraph 1 of Security Council resolution 2368 (2017), and adopted under Chapter VII of the Charter of the United Nations.
The following Security Council press statement was issued today by Council President Linda Thomas-Greenfield (United States):
The conflict and humanitarian crisis in Yemen is taking a dramatic turn for the worse, with Houthi rebels pursuing a military offensive in Marib governorate alongside a surge in cross-border attacks on Saudi Arabia, but a renewed diplomatic commitment by the United States to end the six-year conflict offers a glimmer of hope that peace is still possible, senior United Nations officials told a videoconference meeting of the Security Council today.
On the tenth anniversary of the start of conflict in Syria, the senior United Nations official for that country expressed his profound regret that the world body has not yet been able to broker an end to the crisis, while calling for new, creative international diplomacy, during a Security Council videoconference meeting today.
The Security Council decided today to increase the authorized size of the United Nations Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission in the Central African Republic (MINUSCA) to enhance its ability to perform its priority mandated tasks “in the current evolving context”.
