Meetings Coverage

As they continued their annual session today, States parties to the Convention on the Law of the Sea heard a briefing by the President of the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea on that body’s financial reports for the 2007-2008 period and recent proposed changes on the remuneration of its judges.

Experts addressing the role of the 192 United Nations Member States in the global economic architecture said today that reforming the financial and economic systems would require some States to give up part of their “voice” so that others could be heard, as Nobel Laureate Joseph Stiglitz asserted that “failure to create adequate institutions for managing globalization has put the global economy at risk”.

The Special Committee on Decolonization concluded its resumed session this morning by taking up the question of Tokelau, the report of the Caribbean Regional Seminar and the report on issues related to its own work.

Robert Serry, Special Coordinator for the Middle East peace process and Personal Representative of the Secretary-General, told the Security Council today that diplomatic efforts to reinvigorate the Middle East peace process had continued, and recent meetings -- including of the Quartet on Friday -- were part of a concentrated push to create the conditions for re-launching efforts for a two-State solution.

The States parties to the Convention on the Law of the Sea today heard briefings by the heads of the three bodies established by the treaty -- the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea, International Seabed Authority and the Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf -- as they continued their annual session.

The Security Council this morning renewed the mandate of the United Nations Disengagement Observer Force (UNDOF), which has supervised the ceasefire between Israel and Syria since 1974, for the six months ending 30 December 2009.

The States parties to the Convention on the Law of the Sea today heard briefings by the heads of the three bodies established by the treaty -- the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea, International Seabed Authority and the Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf -- as they continued their annual session.

With presidential elections in Guinea-Bissau less than a week away, the top United Nations envoy there, concerned that the people of the poverty-stricken West African nation were gripped by paranoia and the Government was paralysed following a wave of recent political assassinations, today appealed to the Security Council and the international community to provide much-needed support for the ballot, as well as for much-needed institutional and governance reforms.

If the Central African Republic was to build on the momentum created by the national political dialogue held in late 2008 and to overcome threats posed by sporadic rebel violence in its northern villages, the United Nations top political official today told the Security Council that the country must take ownership of and fully implement its recently adopted peacebuilding framework, which covered key priorities such as security, disarmament, good governance and development.

The States parties to the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea opened their nineteenth meeting todaywith a call for universal accession to that treaty, adoption of a provisional agenda and election of its Bureau.