UN members on Friday voted to allow Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to give a video address to the General Assembly, thwarting attempts by Russia and its allies to silence him.
Next week's annual gathering will bring heads of state from around the world to UN headquarters in New York to address the assembly. Such speeches are ordinarily given in person, though video addresses were allowed in 2020 and 2021 during the Covid-19 pandemic.
The US was one of 101 UN member states that voted in favour of a motion to allow Mr Zelenskyy to deliver his speech via video, given the “very exceptional circumstance” of the war with Russia.
Seven nations, including Russia, Belarus, Nicaragua, Cuba, North Korea, Syria and Eritrea voted against the measure. Nineteen countries abstained, including China, which appears to be growing increasingly concerned with the Russia-initiated war.
Belarus put forward a Russia-backed proposal to allow any country to address the General Assembly by video but it failed to garner enough votes to proceed.
Russian President Vladimir Putin is set to miss this year's assembly, but Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov may attend.
The US ambassador to the UN, Linda Thomas-Greenfield, told reporters on Friday that the US delegation has no current plans to meet Russian diplomats.
“We will be having meetings with the Ukrainians,” Ms Thomas-Greenfield said.
“There are no plans at this time to have meetings with the Russians. They have not indicated that they have an interest in diplomacy.”
She called for nations to hold Russia accountable for its actions in Ukraine.
“Our response to Russia's flagrant violations cannot be to abandon the founding principles of this organisation that we believe so strongly in,” she said.
“We must double down on our commitment to a peaceful world and hold even closer our deeply held principles of sovereignty, territorial integrity, peace and security.”
US President Joe Biden will be delivering his speech to the UN General Assembly on Wednesday morning. He was originally set to speak on Tuesday but is attending Queen Elizabeth II’s funeral in London on Monday.
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4,872 matches
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76 nations
26 UAE teams
15 Lebanese teams
2 Kuwaiti teams
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New UK refugee system
- A new “core protection” for refugees moving from permanent to a more basic, temporary protection
- Shortened leave to remain - refugees will receive 30 months instead of five years
- A longer path to settlement with no indefinite settled status until a refugee has spent 20 years in Britain
- To encourage refugees to integrate the government will encourage them to out of the core protection route wherever possible.
- Under core protection there will be no automatic right to family reunion
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What are the regulations?
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- Should have a live feed of the drone flight
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Tips for taking the metro
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How much of your income do you need to save?
The more you save, the sooner you can retire. Tuan Phan, a board member of SimplyFI.com, says if you save just 5 per cent of your salary, you can expect to work for another 66 years before you are able to retire without too large a drop in income.
In other words, you will not save enough to retire comfortably. If you save 15 per cent, you can forward to another 43 working years. Up that to 40 per cent of your income, and your remaining working life drops to just 22 years. (see table)
Obviously, this is only a rough guide. How much you save will depend on variables, not least your salary and how much you already have in your pension pot. But it shows what you need to do to achieve financial independence.
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UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
The Perfect Couple
Starring: Nicole Kidman, Liev Schreiber, Jack Reynor
Creator: Jenna Lamia
Rating: 3/5
WHAT IS A BLACK HOLE?
1. Black holes are objects whose gravity is so strong not even light can escape their pull
2. They can be created when massive stars collapse under their own weight
3. Large black holes can also be formed when smaller ones collide and merge
4. The biggest black holes lurk at the centre of many galaxies, including our own
5. Astronomers believe that when the universe was very young, black holes affected how galaxies formed
