On October 18, 2011, Mr. Carlos Lopes, Executive Director of UNITAR and Mr. Mohammed El Amine Bencherif, Director General a.i. of Political Affairs and International Security of the People's Democratic Republic of Algeria, signed a Partnership Agreement for the establishment of an International Training Centre for Local Actors (CIFAL Maghreb) in Algiers.

October 2011, Geneva, Switzerland. The United Nations Development Programme – Regional Bureau for Africa (UNDP RBA) and UNITAR’s Public Finance and Trade Programme successfully conducted the skills-building workshop on “Négociations financières multilatérales: les défis pour l’Afrique” (Geneva, 20 to 21 October 2011).

18 October 2011, Accra – In the context of the GEF/UNDP/UNITAR/EPA-Ghana Project on Capacity Building for the Elimination of PCBs in Ghana, a Project Steering Committee was held in Accra on 18 October 2011. The Committee reviewed progress to date, the current workplan for 2011 and in particular progress related to the inventory of electrical transformers in Ghana. The next Committee meeting will take place in December 2011.

18 October 2011, Geneva, Switzerland.  In keeping with its strategic commitment towards community mapping, UNOSAT has joined resources with Google to make online crisis maps available for the current Thailand floods and the ongoing complex emergency and drought in the Horn of Africa.

On the occasion of the Third session of the Advisory Board of the UNITAR Peacekeeping Training Programme a well-attended high-level Round Table discussion entitled: “They Fight Like Soldiers, They Die Like Children.

29 September 2011, Geneva, Switzerland – UNOSAT has released a 2010 human security report elaborated by its satellite imagery analysts and GIS experts to monitor the evolution of piracy off the coast of Somali during the period 2005-2009. The report had been in circulation to selected UN and non-UN partners and agencies and is now publicly available on the web.The report focuses on Somali pirate attacks based on a detailed geospatial study of available data between 2005 and 2009.

The UNITAR Peacekeeping Training Programme held the Third Session of its Advisory Board in Geneva on Wednesday, 12 October 2011. This important annual event, presided by its Chair, Mr. Jean-Marie Guéhenno, former Under Secretary General for Peacekeeping Operations was also attended by four of its eminent members: Lieutenant General the Honourable Roméo A.

12 October 2011, Geneva, Switzerland.  UNOSAT work in support to the international humanitarian and human rights communities was at the centre of discussions at the UNITAR-WMO Symposium on “leveraging satellite solutions for global challenges” that concluded successfully in Geneva on 12 October 2011.

12-13 October 2011, Geneva, Switzerland. The workshop on “Regional Integration: Key Negotiation Challenges Moving Forward”, which was directed by Dr. El Hadji A. Diouf (Executive Director, African Agency for Trade and Development) and Dr.

With the generous support of the Swiss Development Cooperation (SDC), Indonesia and Malawi will join Benin, Uganda and the Dominican Republic as the fourth and fifth pilot country to start a UN CC: Learn project in 2011. The five countries were selected by the UN CC: Learn Steering Group in July 2011 from among 23 countries who had submitted an application to participate in the UN CC: Learn Pilot Implementation Phase, 2011-2013.