Strengthening the role of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe in the European security architecture and improving its partnership with the United Nations in tackling threats to global peace and security would be key priorities for the Government of Kazakhstan in 2010, as the country took over the regional body’s leadership, Foreign Minister and incoming Chairman-in-Office Kanat Saudabayev told the Security Council today.

The challenges facing Darfur must be met within a national context at this critical time for Sudan, Dmitry Titov, Assistant Secretary-General for Peacekeeping Operations, told the Security Council today, emphasizing that core issues such as power- and wealth-sharing required a comprehensive and farsighted approach that took into account the interests of all stakeholders, particularly those too long marginalized by the conflict.

The Security Council today committed itself to improving its strategies for ending or reconfiguring peacekeeping missions, or for their transition to other kinds of United Nations presences, following a day-long discussion involving top officials of the Organization as well as representatives of regional organizations, troop-contributing countries and the wider membership.

Cautioning against the “persistent scepticism and impatience” that characterized much of the discourse on Iraq, the top United Nations envoy in that country told the Security Council today that preparations for next month’s general elections were nearly complete, and with close to 19 million Iraqis expected to cast their ballots, even those determined to disrupt the poll and derail national reconciliation through violence could not reverse Iraq’s progress.

A month after leaders in Guinea signed a deal to end the political crisis sparked when Government forces killed at least 150 unarmed protesters at a rally last September, the Security Council today welcomed the appointment of the new transitional Government, and urged all Guinean stakeholders to work together in steering the West African nation towards democratic elections by July 2010.

While conflicts in Africa and the Middle East once again dominated the Security Council’s agenda in 2009, the United Nations body charged with maintaining international peace and security also advanced its work on increasingly critical thematic issues such as nuclear disarmament and non-proliferation, and the protection of civilians in armed conflict.

Expressing concern over the continuing deadlock in Israeli-Palestinian negotiations, a senior United Nations political official today urged both sides to embrace a recent proposal to begin indirect talks mediated by the United States.

Keeping the spotlight squarely on the vast needs in earthquake-devastated Haiti while rallying global support for the tiny, vulnerable country’s long-term recovery, the top United Nations humanitarian and peacekeeping officials said today that it was now imperative that the international community bolster efforts by the Haitian Government to remove mountains of rubble and provide adequate shelter and sanitation facilities.

Though Timor-Leste had made “remarkable progress” since 2006, when a dispute over discrimination among military forces sparked protests and widespread violence that drove thousands of people from their homes, the top United Nations official there warned the Security Council today that the tiny country was still fragile and faced a raft of socio-economic challenges that could prove even more daunting to tackle.

With the top United Nations anti-drug official urging concerted global action to “break the vicious circle between insecurity and underdevelopment” being increasingly fuelled by criminal networks, drug smugglers and human traffickers, the Security Council today called on the world body’s Member States to increase international and regional cooperation to tackle transnational organized crime.