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United Nations Daily Highlights 96-06-11United Nations Daily Highlights Directory - Previous Article - Next ArticleFrom: The United Nations Home Page at <http://www.un.org> - email: unnews@un.orgDAILY HIGHLIGHTSTuesday, June 11, 1996This document is prepared by the Central News Section of the Department of Public Information and is updated every week-day at approximately 6:00 PM. HEADLINES
Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali, in a meeting with President Glafkos Clerides of Cyprus, in Geneva today, focused on the need to find common ground as the basis for resuming direct talks between the leaders of the two communities in Cyprus, according to a UN Spokesman. The Secretary- General emphasized the importance of both sides working with his new Special Representative for Cyprus, Professor Han Sung-Joo and his Deputy Special Representative, Mr. Gustave Feissel. They also discussed the question of missing persons and the tragic incident on 3 June in which a National Guard soldier was shot and killed in Nicosia. The Secretary-General had met on 6 June in Istanbul with Mr. Rauf Denktash, the leader of the Turkish Cypriot community. To achieve adequate protection of their habitats, it is necessary to protect and promote the traditional knowledge and life-styles of indigenous people, the representative of Brazil, Gerardo Holanda Cavalcanti, told the United Nations Conference on Human Settlements (Habitat II) yesterday, as delegates took time out to observe the International Decade of the World's Indigenous People. He noted that the traditional entities "embody some of the best practices for the sustainable management and utilization" of natural resources. The observance followed the general exchange of views on the state of human settlements. In his opening statement, the Assistant Secretary-General for Human Rights and Coordinator of the International Decade of the World's Indigenous People, Ibrahima Fall, said indigenous people continue to face numerous problems such as forced expulsion from their land and dwellings. Protection of their land was the crux of their life and culture; the essence of their history, he added. He noted that the Global Plan of Action, to be adopted by the Conference, "should reflect their yearnings". The official observance of the International Decade of the World's Indigenous People was mandated by the UN General Assembly in 1995, with the intention of attracting the world's attention to the habitat issues facing some 300 million indigenous people across the globe. The International Decade (1995-2004) has established a framework to bolster international cooperation to solve the problems of the indigenous people, in cooperation and consultation with them. Today, delegates called for the coordination of national actions with regional and global agencies, as the Second United Nations Conference on Human Settlements (Habitat II) concluded its general exchange of views on the status of human settlements. The Conference was told that regional commissions, in particular, were mandated and uniquely situated to coordinate such actions, according to a UN report from Istanbul. Speaking on behalf of the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), Chile's Minister of Housing and Development, Don Edmundo Hermosilla, said the development of an action plan for the region demonstrated the opportunities that could be generated when countries that share geographic proximity and numerous similarities cooperated in their search for solutions to large-scale problems. ECLAC's Action Plan had enabled the Organization to assume concrete commitments "not only for relieving the most urgent housing deficiencies" but also regarding problems such as extreme poverty. Echoing that view, Administrator of the UN Development Programme (UNDP) James Gustave Speth noted that within the unprecedented opulence of cities there existed crushing poverty. He called for a vision that sought to end mass poverty and encompassed the right to adequate housing. The Executive Secretary of the Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP), Adrianus Mooy, urged delegates to rediscover the fact that cities were not just economic engines but first and foremost "where people live, work, and anchor their lives". He pointed out that facing urban challenges required change which encompassed the whole society. One more United Nations member State has paid its assessed contributions to the 1996 regular budget of the United Nations, a UN Spokesman said. Germany paid $49,233,985, the second half of its balance on the regular budget. The country had paid the first half in January. With today's payment, Germany has paid $98,355,470 in full and the contribution brings the total to 71 member States and two non-member states that have so far paid their regular budget assessment. An international peer review of the long-term safety analysis of a waste isolation pilot plant in New Mexico, in the United States would soon be underway, following an agreement reached in Paris among the United States Department of Energy, the Nuclear Energy Agency of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) and the International Atomic Energy Agency. The disposal plant, a United States facility, is expected to receive long-lived radioactive waste in the near future. The review, to be conducted over a six-month period beginning October, was requested by the United States Department of Energy. The objective of the joint agency peer review will be to examine whether the post closure assessment of the plant is appropriate, technically sound and in conformity with international standards and practices. The pilot plant site was selected and constructed to meet the criteria established by the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) for the safe long-term disposal of transuranic waste, consisting primarily of clothing and other disposal items contaminated with radioactive elements, mostly plutonium. For information purposes only - - not an official record From the United Nations home page at <http://www.un.org> - email: unnews@un.orgUnited Nations Daily Highlights Directory - Previous Article - Next Article |
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