Preparations are well underway for a United Nations conference on the challenges and opportunities of partnering with small island developing States, a top UN organizing official today said as representatives are gathering in New York to agree on what will be the outcome of the conference.
“By attending the meeting in Samoa, delegates will exercise and experience the reality of a small island developing States, its vulnerabilities as well as its resilience,” the Conference’s Secretary-General, Wu Hongbo, told journalists in New York.
Representatives of attending Member States are meeting at the UN Headquarters this week for the preparatory meeting ahead of the Third UN Conference on Small Island Developing States, to be held in the Samoan capital, Apia, starting 1 September.
The Conference will be a “unique opportunity for world leaders to focus the world’s attention on a group of countries that remain a special case for sustainable development,” Hongbo said, adding that what happens to small islands has a global impact and is central to the post-2015 agenda.