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The United Nations Secretary-General, Kofi Annan, today wrapped up an official visit to Costa Rica, where he met with the country’s senior officials and visited the University for Peace.

Lakhdar Brahimi, United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan’s Special Representative for Afghanistan, travelled to the city of Herat in the east of Afghanistan today for a series of meetings with local officials.

More than 3,000 unskilled workers – including women – have been recruited by the United Nations Centre for Human Settlements and municipal authorities to clean up the Afghan capital, Kabul, and other urban centres.

Myanmar has postponed a planned visit by a United Nations envoy, citing the illness of Deputy Foreign Minister U Khin Maung Win, a UN spokesperson said in New York today.

The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Mary Robinson, said today she would step down from her post in September, drawing an immediate reaction from Secretary-General Kofi Annan who praised Mrs. Robinson for her great contribution to the cause of human rights.

The United Nations Human Rights Commission opened its fifty-eight session in Geneva today, with UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Mary Robinson, describing the gathering as the forum at which the most comprehensive debate on the state of human rights around the world takes place.

The United Nations Secretary-General, Kofi Annan, has expressed strong support to the call made in Barcelona by the leaders of the European Union who urged Israelis and Palestinians to "stop the bloodshed" and to pursue peace and security through negotiations.

Reacting to the news that the strategic town of Moliro, in the southeastern corner of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, had been captured by elements of the rebel RCD-Goma, United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan voiced grave concern over the development and urged all sides to resume dialogue.

The machinery of an envisaged Special Court for Sierra Leone should be in place by the third quarter of this year to enable the tribunal to function in accordance with its Statute, according to a new United Nations report released today in New York.

The United Nations International Criminal Tribunal for Former Yugoslavia (ICTY) today sentenced former prison warden Milorad Krnojelac to seven years imprisonment for crimes against humanity.