It is the first time since the COVID-19 pandemic broke out that delegates from all across the globe would return to the annual UN meetings in person, after the World Health Organization proclaimed last week the world “had never been in a better position to end the pandemic”.

International civil servants and diplomats have experimented with the format of the meetings for the past two-and-a-half years, having offered countries ways to be represented both virtually and in person under hybrid arrangements. But now that activities are slowly returning to its normal and preferred pace, delegates are converging at the UN headquarters in New York, the United States, to broach various topics underpinning global cooperation.

For Foreign Minister Retno LP Marsudi, her hundreds of meetings over the next 10 days starts with a tête-a-tête with UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres at the UN headquarters in New York on Sunday local time.

She then heads into the new week full of activities that include the annual meeting of foreign ministers on foreign policy and global health, which has underpinned much of global collaborative efforts on COVID-19 mitigation.

Retno currently serves as co-chair of the GAVI COVAX Advance Market Commitment (AMC) Engagement Group, a collaborative financing instrument that supports the participation of 92 low- and middle-income economies in the equitable distribution of COVID-19 vaccines.

Indonesia is also a member of the Champion Group of the Global Crisis Response Group (GCRG), an assembly of nations tasked by the UN Secretary-General to secure a global consensus to advocate solutions to the global food, energy and financial crises.

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