61st UN General Assembly session begins Tuesday

COLOMBO: The General Assembly of the United Nations opens its 61st regular session on Tuesday, September 12 at the United Nations Headquarters in New York.

It brings together the delegations of all Member States, many of them led by Heads of States or Government or foreign ministers for an examination of wide range of international issues, states United Nations Information Centre press release.

Sheikha Haya Rasheed Al Khalifa was elected President of the 61st session of the General Assembly in June this year.

At the time she was serving as Legal Advisor to the Royal Court in the Kingdom of Bahrain.

She brings to the post a long and distinguished legal career at both the national and international level, spanning three decades.

One of the two first women to practice law in her country she has held many senior positions with leading legal organizations of the world including the International Bar Association.

A champion of women's rights Sheikha Haya has been an active participant in the movement to elevate the position of women in Bahrain.

Following the opening, the General Assembly will hold a High-Level Dialogue on International Migration and Development on September 14 and 15. This will be followed, on September 18 and 19, by a High-Level Meeting on the Least Developed Countries which is a midterm review of implementation of the Programme of Action for the Decade 2001-2010.

The general debate, which usually features statements by dozens of Heads of State and Government as well as Ministers, will take place over a nine-day period beginning Tuesday, September 19.

The sixty-first session as a whole, which is scheduled to run through mid September 2007, is also expected to continue work on issues pending from the 2005 World Summit, in addition to other items on its regular agenda.