Calling for greater efforts to promote a culture of tolerance and peace at all levels, the General Assembly adopted a resolution today inviting the Secretary‑General to convene a global conference aimed at advancing the United Nations Plan of Action to Safeguard Religious Sites, involving Governments, political figures, religious leaders, civil society and the media, among other stakeholders.
Citing concerns over COVID-19, the General Assembly decided today to postpone, until 10-12 May 2021, the organizational session of the Ad Hoc Committee to Elaborate a Comprehensive International Convention on Countering the Use of Information and Communications Technologies for Criminal Purposes.
Concluding the main part of its seventy-fifth session, the General Assembly approved $3.21 billion for 2021 and adopted 22 resolutions and 3 decisions recommended by its Main Committees.
The Fifth Committee (Administrative and Budgetary) wrapped up the main part of its seventy-fifth session on Wednesday by approving resources of $3.21 billion for the 2021 regular budget, the Organization’s second annual budget in nearly 50 years. After the United States’ representative’s request for a recorded vote, the budget was approved with 151 delegates voting in favour, the United States and Israel voting against, and one abstention by Sudan.
The General Assembly, acting without a vote, adopted three resolutions and one decision today, including one calling for a further comprehensive review of United Nations peacebuilding in 2025 and another proclaiming 4 February as the International Day of Human Fraternity.
As the COVID‑19 pandemic ravages economies and threatens to reverse hard-won development gains, the General Assembly today adopted 36 resolutions and two decisions of its Second Committee (Economic and Financial), urging the global community to “build back better” in tackling the biggest challenge it has faced since the Second World War.
The General Assembly proclaimed 31 August as the International Day for People of African Descent today, seeking to promote greater recognition and respect for the diverse heritage, culture and contribution of people of African descent to the development of societies, as it adopted 48 resolutions and one decision recommended by the Third Committee (Social, Humanitarian and Cultural).
The Economic and Social Council adopted three decisions related to the Committee on Non-Governmental Organizations and postponed a decision today, stemming from COVID-19 pandemic-related changes to its working methods, on whether to reopen its 2020 session to reconsider the draft ministerial declaration of its high-level political forum on sustainable development, held in July.
The General Assembly today reaffirmed the vital role of the Sixth Committee (Legal) as its primary forum for considering legal questions, adopting without a vote 19 draft resolutions and 10 draft decisions recommended by the Committee, including four new requests for observer status.
Against the backdrop of the COVID‑19 pandemic, the General Assembly adopted two health‑related resolutions this morning — one, by recorded vote, underscoring the importance of affordable health care for all and of monitoring the unfolding impact of the novel coronavirus, and another, by consensus, declaring 2021 to 2030 as the United Nations Decade of Healthy Ageing.
Delegates struck a cautiously hopeful note as the General Assembly completed its special session dedicated to the COVID‑19 pandemic, while stressing the need for multilateral approaches to distributing vaccines and mitigating the pandemic’s wide-ranging fallout.
The General Assembly adopted four humanitarian-focused resolutions today, with delegates warning of ever-growing challenges in 2021 as the broader effects of the COVID‑19 pandemic — including prolonged economic hardship and threat of major famine — begin to take hold.
Citing the threat posed by chronic terrorist violence in Afghanistan, delegates commended fresh progress in peace talks and exchanged views on the best way to help the nation move into a new era of stability and prosperity, as the General Assembly adopted, by a recorded vote, its annual resolution on the situation in the country.
The Economic and Social Council elected several countries to fill 15 outstanding vacancies in eight of its subsidiary bodies while also nominating Germany as a member of the Committee for Programme and Coordination.
Upon the recommendation of its Fourth Committee (Special Political and Decolonization), the General Assembly adopted 34 draft resolutions and 3 draft decisions today, on questions ranging from the Israeli‑Palestinian conflict and decolonization to the effects of atomic radiation and the peaceful uses of outer space.
The 2020 International Media Seminar on Peace in the Middle East concluded today, with a vibrant online panel discussion exploring how trends in the systematic spread of untruths have changed the way traditional news outlets cover the Israel-Palestine conflict, and created avenues for citizen journalists to quickly push out stories to express their lived realities.
The General Assembly adopted a draft resolution today on sustainable fisheries, and postponed action on a second text on the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, as delegates reflected on how the COVID‑19 pandemic derailed what should have been a watershed year for international action on the world’s oceans.
In a contentious debate, the Second Committee (Economic and Financial) rejected two amendments to its draft resolution on the quadrennial comprehensive policy review by recorded vote, later approving that text as a whole by another vote.
Journalists, media experts, policymakers and scholars within academic and faith communities in Palestine, Israel and elsewhere gathered for the opening of the twenty‑seventh annual International Media Seminar on Peace in the Middle East today, held for the first time in virtual format, amid the ongoing COVID‑19 pandemic.
The General Assembly this morning adopted three resolutions dealing with prevention of armed conflict and global health and foreign policy, including one urging the Russian Federation to withdraw from Crimea and another that declared 27 December as an International Day of Epidemic Preparedness.
