Search Results for: United Nations

BY KEITH NUTHALL and ALAN OSBORN
THE NEW International Code for the Security of Ships and Port Facilities, agreed by an International Maritime Organisation (IMO) Diplomatic Conference, held in London, aims at reducing the industry’s exposure to terrorist attacks and resulting damage.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE REPUBLIC of the Congo (Brazzaville) has launched a case at the International Court of Justice, in the Hague, which is trying to undermine the principle of extra-territoriality under which activist magistrates, for instance in Belgium and Spain, have been seeking to prosecute crimes committed abroad.…

BY MARK ROWE
WARS are usually fought over coveted resources, such as oil, diamonds or fertile land. Now water, the most indispensable of mankind’s needs, is seen as the resource which may spark the armed conflicts of the 21st century.

Indeed, United Nations (UN) cultural and scientific organisation UNESCO is stepping up efforts to calm tension in some of the world’s most water-stressed areas.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE NEW International Code for the Security of Ships and Port Facilities, agreed by an International Maritime Organisation (IMO) Diplomatic Conference, held in London, last month (Dec) aims at reducing the industry’s exposure to terrorist attacks and resulting damage.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE INTERNATIONAL Maritime Organisation will next week (9-13 Dec) stage a Diplomatic Conference that should agree a new International Code for the Security of Ships and Port Facilities. This is to be attached as an annexe to this United Nations (UN) agency’s International Convention for the Safety of Life at Sea (SOLAS), and should come into force by next June, assuming there are no significant objections from any of the 146 IMO member countries which have already accepted SOLAS.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
OFFICIALS from the United States and European Union have been meeting to solve differences over the Americans’ Container Security Initiative. The EU and the US have agreed to quickly explore signing a cooperation deal on operating a mutually acceptable container security system, but problems remain, for instance on the proposed US 24 hours rule, requiring carriers to provide American customs with cargo manifest information a day before it is loaded on board a USA-bound vessel.…

KEITH NUTHALL
CANADA has joined formal World Trade Organisation (WTO) disputes talks initiated by Brazil against the United States regarding American government subsidies to producers, users and exporters of upland cotton. The Brazilians claim that these payments break the WTO’s Agreement on Subsidies and Countervailing Measures, Agreement on Agriculture, and General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT).…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE UNITED Nations’ Food and Agricultural Organisation (FAO) is predicting the extinction of the virulent cattle disease rinderpest by a UN deadline of 2010. It is trying to eradicate the last traces of the virus in northeast Kenya and southern Somalia.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
AN EXPERT United Nations committee has adopted a new global labelling and classification system for chemicals, designed to prevent the mismanagement of hazardous and dangerous substances. The system agreed by the UN Committee of Experts on the Transport of Dangerous Goods and the Globally Harmonized System of Classification and Labelling of Chemicals uses universally understandable pictogram-based labels.…

KEITH NUTHALL
SWITZERLAND has donated US$2.5 million to a new international BioTrade Facilitation Programme which will fund the development of export industries in poor countries based on under-exploited natural resources, notably fibre plants. The scheme will be run by the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) and its International Trade Centre joint venture with the World Trade Organisation.…