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Late Breaking News on Habitat II

Last updated 12 June 1996 --

A booth at the NGO Forum calling for an end to evictions. The drafting group handling difficult issues in the Habitat Agenda agreed Tuesday to text on forced evictions, details of which will likely be discussed in Wednesday's full working group.
Working Group I debated a number of principles on environment and development, adopting text on the precautionary approach but rejecting the use of an "ecological footprint." Several countries argued for the inclusion of the effects of nuclear weapons testing on human settlements in the Habitat Agenda, but the US said it was not an appropriate debate for Habitat II. In the Commitments chapter, several countries called for restoration of the equal right of inheritance, but Qatar and Iran objected.

In its third day of debate on implementation and follow-up of the Habitat Agenda, Working Group II came closer to an agreement on on the role of the UN Centre for Human Settlements and the UN Commission on Human Settlements. Various formulations would have the Commission "follow closely" the UN system's activities in human settlements, "follow up and monitor" or "track the progress of activities." A new paragraph would strengthen the mandate of the Commission and expand it to include implmenenting the Habitat Agenda. The US said the Commission's mandate should be reoriented in the context of UN reform. Delegates debated whether they or other bodies in the UN system could review and change the Commission's mandate.

Details on debate from the Conference's eigth day are in Tuesday's Earth Negotiations Bulletin from Habitat II.

Editor's Note: The ENB's photo coverage has been unfortunately interrupted. Our roving camera was last seen touring Istanbul, all by itself in the back of a taxi where I left it. Stay tuned. (-=- sw)
To catch up on the Conference to date, check out Late Breaking News from We will continue our live coverage of Habitat II through 14 June. We have recorded RealAudio interviews and daily issues in English and French of the Earth Negotiations Bulletin. More pictures (maybe) and sound coming soon. Stay tuned!!

ENB will not be covering most of the Plenary statements. These statements and press releasesare available on the Conference Secretariat's WWW site.

Here is the conference document that is being debated in Istanbul.

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The Third Session of the Preparatory Committee for the UN Conference on Human Settlements (Habitat II) ended in New York during February. Although the spirit of negotiation was good, procedural bottlenecks and the volume of work to be finished produced less than favorable results.

The Earth Negotiations Bulletin prepared a comprehensive summary of the Third Session of the PrepCom, which includes an analysis of the process through PrepCom 3.

In addition, we have posted RealAudio recordings of the final statements If you have any late-breaking news, updates or recent material on Habitat II, send us e-mail at enb@igc.apc.org

We published daily issues of the Earth Negotiations Bulletinin French and English from New York. Our daily issues are 2000-word summaries of the official proceedings.

Here is a link to the UN's gopher for press releases on Human Settlements.