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DOCUMENTS
WHAT?
The Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) and the Peacebuilding Commission (PBC) convened a Joint Meeting on the Situation in the Sahel on Wednesday, 28 June 2017, from 10:30 AM to 1 PM, in Conference Room 4. The meeting was chaired by His Excellency Ambassador Frederick Musiiwa Makamure Shava, President of ECOSOC and His Excellency Ambassador Cho Tae-yul, Chair of the Peacebuilding Commission.
WHY?
The Joint Meeting focused on the Sahel region, building on last year’s joint meeting on the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and Sustaining Peace (24 June 2016). The situation in the Sahel region remains fragile, despite efforts at national, regional and international levels. The challenges are complex and multidimensional, and require a regional and cross-border cooperation for stability, resilience and long-term development. Using the UN Integrated Strategy for the Sahel (UNISS) as a base, the meeting engaged the United Nations Office for West Africa and the Sahel (UNOWAS) and other stakeholders in the Sahel region to enhance coherence across political, security, peacebuilding, development and humanitarian actors. The joint meeting underscored the need to focus more on addressing the root causes of poverty, in particular the lack of economic opportunities and decent jobs, food insecurity and climate change while avoiding a disproportionate emphasis on security. A regional approach to addressing the cross-border development challenges and strengthening partnerships with better coordination and coherence among development partners were considered critical.
WHO?
The ECOSOC and PBC joint meeting brought together high-level representatives of Member States from both bodies, and from the African region, including the Group of Five for the Sahel (Burkina Faso, Chad, Mali, Mauritania and Niger), and representatives of the United Nations system.