Policy and Rights

Following are UN Secretary-General António Guterres’ remarks at the Security Council meeting on “Maintenance of International Peace and Security:  Promoting Common Security through Dialogue and Cooperation”, today in New York: Thank you for convening the Council on this essential topic. Our collective security demands that we seize every moment to forge a common understanding of the threats and ch...

**Secretary-General’s Travel Good afternoon and happy Friday to everyone. The Secretary-General has recently arrived in Chisinau, the capital of Moldova, where he is set to meet the President of Moldova, Maia Sandru. Earlier today, the Secretary-General traveled to Odesa, Ukraine’s main Black Sea port, where he was greeted by Oleksandr Kubrakov, the country’s infrastructure minister. The Secretary...

**Secretary-General’s Travel The Secretary-General is in Lviv, where he has met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. The two were later joined by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan for a trilateral meeting. In his remarks to the press just now, the Secretary-General reiterated that the United Nations will go on working in full solidarity with the Ukrainian people to mobilize all of ou...

Almost 7,500 cases were reported last week, a 20% increase over the previous week, which was also 20% more than the week before. Almost all cases are being reported from Europe and the Americas, and almost all cases continue to be reported among men who have sex with men, underscoring the importance for all countries to design and deliver services and information tailored to these communities that...

Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/policy-and-rights--3339563/support .

UKRAINE I want to start off with a note and a clarification on Ukraine. As you may have seen in the past few days, there have been repeated comments by various Russian officials accusing the United Nations Secretariat of having either cancelled or blocked a visit by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant. I want to clarify a few points. First, the IAE...

SECRETARY-GENERAL/TRAVELS The Secretary-General has arrived in the Republic of Korea. Tomorrow he will meet President Yoon Suk Yeol, as well as the Minister of Foreign Affairs. And earlier today in an interview in Ulaanbaatar he expressed his gratitude to the Government and the people of Mongolia for their hospitality and for their support for the UN’s work, as well as the country’s commitment to...

SOUTH SUDAN The UN Mission in South Sudan (UNMISS) joins the South Sudanese Government in expressing grave concern over reports that four officers from the rebel South Sudan People’s Movement/Army (SSPM/A) have been summarily executed in Mayom County, Unity State, in the north of the country. The executions, which took place on 7 August, were allegedly in response to a 22 July attack by the SSPM/A...

SECRETARY-GENERAL/TRIP The Secretary-General arrived in Ulaanbaatar, today – the capital of Mongolia today. This is his second stop during this current trip. As you know, Mongolia is a nuclear weapon free zone, and has also been an important interlocutor of the United Nations in relation to the situation on the Korean Peninsula. The issue of the Peninsula will come up in discussions the Secretary-...

Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland holds a news conference in Grand Pré, Nova Scotia, after touring a local winery. She discusses her government's record on helping small businesses and highlights a $166 million investment in Canada’s wine sector that was previously announced in the 2022 federal budget. Liberal MP Kody Blois (Kings–Hants) and Hanspeter Stutz (owner and president of Domaine de...

SECRETARY-GENERAL’S TRAVEL The Secretary-General arrived in Hiroshima, in Japan, a few hours ago, where he will take part tomorrow in the Peace Memorial Ceremony. At the ceremony, he will reiterate his call on world leaders to urgently eliminate stockpiles of nuclear weapons. He will also meet a group of surviving victims of the atomic bombs, known as the hibakusha, in Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Mr....

UN chief said that “Every day we wait leads us closer to a global breakdown – both physical and political. But while the problems before us are unprecedented, they are not insurmountable.” Briefing today (4 Aug) on the progress in the implementation of recommendations contained in the report on “Our Common Agenda”, Secretary-General António Guterres said that global shocks are “unabated and growin...

Defence Minister Anita Anand announced the plan on Thursday, saying up to 225 Canadian Armed Forces members will eventually be based in Britain for an initial period of four months. There they will work alongside counterparts from Britain, the Netherlands and New Zealand in training Ukrainian soldiers on the basics of soldiering. “Training missions like this, assisting our allies and our partners...

Join Premier John Horgan; Anne Kang, Minister of Advanced Education and Skills Training; Mitzi Dean, MLA for Esquimalt-Metchosin; and others for an announcement about expanding post-secondary education for students on the Westshore. Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/policy-and-rights--3339563/support .

Briefing by António Guterres, UN Secretary-General and the UN Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) Secretary-General Rebeca Grynspan to introduce the third report of the Global Crisis Response Group. Earlier this year, the Secretary-General launched this series of reports to examine the impact of the war in Ukraine on food, fuel and finance sectors. Secretary-General António Guterres today...

SG TRIP ANNOUNCEMENT The Secretary-General will be heading to Japan, where he will take part in the Peace Memorial Ceremony in Hiroshima, held on 6 August every year. The ceremony aims to console the souls of those lost to the atomic bombing, as well as to pray for the realization of lasting world peace. The Secretary-General will honour the victims of the bombings, commemorate all victims of the...

Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons- Tenth Review Conference final Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/policy-and-rights--3339563/support .

Hybrid press briefing by Ambassador Zhang Jun, Permanent Representative of China and President of the Security Council for August. Asked about a possible visit by the Speaker of the United States House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi to Taiwan, Chinese Ambassador Zhang Jun said, “our position is firm. Our determination is firm. We will do whatever we can to defend our sovereignty and territorial i...

Congress passes bipartisan $280 billion bill aimed at challenging China’s dominance in chip manufacturing A bill authorizing $280 billion to boost the country’s manufacturing and technological competitiveness against China is one step closer to becoming a law. The legislation, called CHIPS and Science Act, Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/policy-and-rights--3339...

Adopting resolution 2647 (2022) (to be issued as document S/RES/2647) by a vote of 12 in favour to none against, with three abstentions (Gabon, Ghana, Kenya), the Council reiterated its decision that UNSMIL should be led by a Special Representative of the Secretary-General in Tripoli and called on the Secretary-General to promptly appoint the same. Through the text, the Council also called on the...

The goal over the next four months is to get some 20 million tons of grain out of three Ukrainian sea ports blocked since Russia's Feb. 24 invasion. That provides time for about four to five large bulk carriers per day to transport grain from the ports to millions of impoverished people worldwide facing hunger. Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/policy-and-rights-...

On Parliament Hill, Conservative MPs Raquel Dancho, Stephen Ellis and Rick Perkins hold a news conference ahead of the House of Commons public safety committee's first meeting on alleged political interference in the investigation of the 2020 Nova Scotia mass shooting. The committee is examining whether former Public Safety Minister Bill Blair and the Prime Minister's Office exerted political pres...

Briefing by Lynn Hastings, Deputy Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process and UN Resident Coordinator and Humanitarian Coordinator for the Occupied Palestinian Territory, on the situation in the Middle East, including the Palestinian question. The Deputy Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process, Lynn Hastings said, “immediate steps to reverse negative trends and to suppo...

I humbly beg forgiveness for the evil committed by so many Christians against the Indigenous Peoples. Pope Francis Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/policy-and-rights--3339563/support .

A month ago, I convened the Emergency Committee under the International Health Regulations to assess whether the multi-country monkeypox outbreak represented a public health emergency of international concern. At that meeting, while differing views were expressed, the committee resolved by consensus that the outbreak did not represent a public health emergency of international concern. At the time...