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Update on Civil Society involvement in High Level Meeting

Zonny Woods (IWHC) and Kieran Daly (ICASO) just recently met with the facilitators/co-chairs of the High Level Meeting on AIDS in June 2008 (Ambassadors to Estonia and Botswana), UNAIDS NY, and the Office of the President of the General Assembly. This was mainly as an initial briefing for them on civil society involvement. We discussed issues related to NGO Accreditation, Civil Society Support Mechanism, Outcome document, Secretary-General's report, Civil Society Hearing, and Panels.

Key outcomes:

  • S-G report - they expect that by mid February UNAIDS (Paul DeLay's team) will submit to the S-G's office a draft outline of a report based on the country progress reports. They should include/consider the shadow reports (these will be available on www.icaso.org and www.ungasshiv.org ).
  • The S-G report will be used to help define the panel discussion issues. We also asked that the shadow reports are used to develop the SG-report.
  • Civil Society Hearing - we informed them that the key 'ask' from CS was that there be a focus on CS involvement in the national review process, especially key populations. It was suggested that it would be good to use the Civil Society Hearing (2 hours) to focus on this one strategic issue, for recommendations to the General Assembly.
  • Co-Chairs are stated that they are committed to ensuring that the CS Hearing outcomes are included in the GA President's summary outcome document.
  • Summary outcome document will not be ready for the closing, but will be finalised after the HLM.
  • We requested that the Co-chairs meet with the CS Task Force at the February meeting.
  • Closer to the HLM, the OPGA will hold a briefing session for Member States to prepare them for the HLM - this could include CS Task Force and/or CS.
  • Given the challenges in 2006 of getting a civil society meeting space big enough and the need to book early, we requested that UNAIDS book a large meeting room in the UN for the whole day prior to the HLM/CS Hearing/Panels - possible to hold a half day for CS briefing/orientation and half day for a bigger unofficial CS 'Hearing' (but this would have to be planned or decided upon by the Task Force).
  • We also asked UNAIDS to also book a smaller room (alphabet room) for during the HLM for CS caucuses.

Latest

The President of the General Assembly's summary of the 2008 High Level Meeting on the review of the Declaration of Commitment on HIV/AIDS and the Political Declaration on HIV/AIDS, which was held in New York from 10 to 12 June 2008. is now available. Click below to download the report.

Nearly 250 organisations and unions from more than 60 countries that signed on their support to demand G8 countries to keep their promises on universal access. The following letter was sent to all G7 leaders on 4 July 2008. A related press statement was issued, which you can view here. Please continue to check back for updates.