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Expressing disappointment over the lack of common ground during the past few months of talks over the future of the United Nations-run province of Kosovo, Secretary-General Kofi Annan has called for “more flexibility” from both the Serbian and Kosovo delegations, saying they need to show a spirit of compromise.

Three weeks after supporters of the two leading presidential candidates in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) clashed in the streets of Kinshasa, the two politicians have finally agreed to meet face to face, the UN mission in the country reported today.

With last week’s lifting of the Israeli air and sea blockade of Lebanon, the United Nations said today that air and sea traffic had begun returning to levels seen before the month-long conflict, while the UN food agency announced it would conduct a survey this month to assess reconstruction needs.

Wrapping up an eight-day mission to southern Sudan, the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Uganda and the Great Lakes region of Africa, the United Nations Emergency Relief Coordinator today expressed cautious optimism about prospects for peace in the region.

As the General Assembly opened its 61st session today, the body’s new president promised to focus on alleviating extreme poverty and advancing the process of UN reform undertaken during the previous session.

Thirty countries are expected to sign and ratify international treaties at an upcoming annual United Nations event designed to spur participation in these pacts, the UN Legal Counsel said today.

Hundreds of thousands of people in the volatile Darfur region of Sudan have gone hungry for three consecutive months because fighting and banditry have prevented the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) from reaching them, the agency’s representative to the country said today.

The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) this week began feeding survivors of recent flooding in southwestern Nepal, nearly 80,000 people affected by extensive flooding who are believed to be cut off from regular access to food and shelter.

The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) today announced the dispatch of a mission of experts to Lebanon to assess the possible damage caused to historical sites in the recent conflict there.

The Director-General of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) today spoke out against the recent kidnapping and beheading of Sudanese newspaper editor Mohammed Taha Mohammed Ahmed in Khartoum and urged that the perpetrators be brought to justice.