NEW YORK (2 June) The United Nations General Assembly Special Session (UNGASS), or, as it is commonly known, the Beijing+5, starts here this Monday. Delegates from all over the world have started arriving in New York; 189 UN member nations are expected to attend.

The Ugandan delegation, led by Her Excellency the Vice President Hon. Specioza Wandira Kazibwe, will be arriving tomorrow. She will be accompanied by Hon. Janat Mukwaya, Hon. Jane Frances Kuka and other government dignitaries.

The special session will review the progress made since the landmark conference held in Beijing 1995 and pledge to remove the remaining obstacles in women's march towards gender equality, development and peace. Already, delegates and UN officials are working overtime to put together a final document for adoption at the end of the session. These meetings or 'intersessionals', as they are called, go on till past midnight as participants debate on contentious issues.

The basic concerns, however, remain the same as at the 1995 conference: poverty, health, armed conflict, power and decision making, media, the girl child, education and training, violence against women, institutional mechanisms, the environment and human rights. During this review process, governments will report on what they have done to achieve the goals set out in the Platform for Action and renew their commitment to improving the status of women in their countries.

The United Nations has recognised the role NGOs play in development by inviting about 3000 NGOs from all over the world. Welcoming this, Ruth Ochieng of Isis-WICCE says, "This is an opportunity for women NGOs to lobby governments at the national and international level to put women's issues at the forefront of the development agenda."

*The Global Women's Media Team (GWMT) for the UN General Assembly Session to Review the Beijing Platform for Action is composed of NGO women and women journalists from Asia-Pacific, Latin America, Africa and Eastern Europe. The GWMT is coordinated by Isis International-Manila and generously supported by UNIFEM-East and Southeast Asia, UNIFEM-South Asia, Canadian International Development Agency-Southeast Asia Gender Equity Programme, UNDP-Latin America and the Caribbean, UNDP-Monglolia, British High Commission in Vanuatu, Foundation for Sustainable Society, Inc., National Centre for Cooperation in Development (NCOS-Pilipinas), Women Action and the World Council of Churches.