The United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia (UNESCWA) will be hosting the Eleventh Meeting of the United Nations Regional Coordination Group on 19-20 June 2006 at the United Nations House, Riadh El Solh Square, Beirut.

The Meeting, which will be opened by UNESCWA Executive Secretary Mervat Tallawy at 5:00 pm on Monday, is intended to coordinate the work of UN Agencies in the region in order to avoid duplication and repetition of their activities.

By initiative of the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia (ESCWA) on International Women’s Day, 58 Arab figures from various intellectual backgrounds today decried violence against women in an appeal that they signed, cognizant of the challenges faced by women in the process of democratic transition in the Arab region. It was circulated in member countries undergoing political transition (Egypt, Libya, Morocco, Tunisia and Yemen) as well as in the ESCWA host country, Lebanon. Below is the complete text of the appeal:

Beirut, 29 July 2010 (UN Information Service) — The Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia (ESCWA) ended today a Regional Workshop for Arab Parliaments on implementing the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) and ending violence against them. Held between 27 and 29 July at the UN House in Beirut, the workshop was organized by ESCWA in cooperation with the Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU), the Lebanese Parliament and the United Nations Development Programme-Parliamentary Development Initiative in the Arab Region (UNDP-PDIAR).