Security Council, General Debate, G77: Here's Your Guide To UN General Assembly Meeting Lingo
Here are an array of acronyms, abbreviations, titles and terms. Here is some key vocabulary of United Nations.
The UN General Assembly's yearly meeting of world leaders is underway, and with it comes a flurry of acronyms, abbreviations, and technical terms. Let's break down some key vocabulary to understand what it means:
UNGA: United Nations General Assembly's ‘High-level Week,’ when presidents, prime ministers, monarchs, and other top leaders of all 193 UN member countries are invited to speak to the world and each other.
General Debate: The centerpiece of the week, it gives each country's leader (or a designee) the mic for a state-of-the-world speech. Speakers are given 15 minutes to share their opinion on the planet's biggest issues and hotspots, spotlight domestic accomplishments and needs, air grievances, and project statesmanship.
Bilateral: Private meetings between high-ranking officials of two countries.
Ministerial: Applies to meetings of cabinet-level officials, such as foreign ministers, from different countries.
Security Council: The UN's most powerful component, responsible for maintaining international peace and security. The council has powers to enact binding resolutions, impose sanctions and deploy peacekeeping troops.
P5: The Security Council's five permanent members with veto power. They are China, France, Russia, the United Kingdom and the United States.
E10: The Security Council's 10 elected, non-permanent members. The General Assembly elects them for two-year terms in seats allocated by region.
G77: Stands for the “Group of 77 and China,” a developing countries interest group that formed within the UN in 1964. The group now has 134 members.
COP30: A major UN climate conference.
1.5 Degrees: A crucial climate threshold. Under the 2015 Paris climate accord, countries agreed to work to limit warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit) over pre-industrial times.
Initials
SDGs: The UN's 'sustainable development goals,' which range from combating climate change to eliminating hunger and poverty to achieving gender equality.
SIDS: At the UN, this stands for some 39 small island developing states.
Brics: A developing-economies coalition that initially included Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa. It has since added others, including Indonesia, Iran, Egypt, Ethiopia and the United Arab Emirates.
NGO: Non-governmental organisation
LDCs: Very poor nations that are known at the UN as ‘least-developed countries.’ Forty-four nations currently meet the criteria.
IFIs: International financial institutions, including the so-called Bretton Woods institutions — the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, which were established at a 1944 UN conference in Bretton Woods, New Hampshire.
