SdeM: Good evening. First of all some logistics. Today the meetings took place both with the government, and I think you had the opportunity of listening to Ambassador Jaafari about his own take on the meeting with us, and then with civil society. Tomorrow will be the HNC in particular and others,…

Rhéal LeBlanc, Chief, Press and External Relations Section, United Nations Information Service in Geneva, chaired the briefing attended by spokespersons of the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, the United Nations Children’s Fund, the World Food Programme, the Office of the High…

The Committee on Enforced Disappearances closed its tenth session today after hearing statements by Juan Jose Lopez Ortega, Committee Rapporteur, and Emmanuel Decaux, Committee Chairperson. Juan Jose Lopez Ortega, Committee Rapporteur, presenting the report of the tenth session, said that the…

SdeM: Good afternoon, today is the end of the first week. The first week of what we have been waiting for, for a very long time, Intra-Syrian talks. It has coincided to a large degree, today there were some incidents, but to a large degree, to a substantial reduction of violence. I have been…

Jan Egeland: We just finished the fifth of the taskforce meeting on humanitarian matters of the ISSG, International Support Group for Syria. We could report that today the third convoy to the four towns has been able to go on its way. They are delivering as we speak to Madaya, to Zabadani, to…

Staffan de Mistura (SdeM): Good evening. Well, it is a good thing to recap. We had today three events, and you must have had already one debriefing on that. We had the Humanitarian Task Force. Jan Egeland debriefed you on that. And the perception we have is that the progress this time is being slow…

RER: Good afternoon. We had a useful meeting today. We discussed issues of substance as you will recall on Monday. The government of Syria delegation provided us with some ideas on the political process. We reacted to them, through seeking further clarifications. I think that the discussion…

GENEVA (Issued as received) – A Russian woman who was denied employment at the helm of a boat because the job was on a list of banned occupations for women in the Russian Federation suffered gender-based discrimination, UN experts have found. The experts, from the Committee on the Elimination of…

Michele Zaccheo, Chief, Radio and Television Section, United Nations Information Service in Geneva, chaired the briefing attended by spokespersons of the Office of the Special Envoy for Syria, Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, the United Nations Refugee Agency, the Office for the…

SdeM: We had a late afternoon meeting today; it started around 5:00 o’clock and ended a few minutes ago. It was with the HNC, the High Negotiations Committee. The first moment of this meeting was dedicated to commemorating by standing, everyone in silence for a minute; we should have been standing…