Highlights of President Buhari’s Meetings with Obama, Hollande and Zuma

NAN(Abuja): Nigeria’s President Muhammadu Buhari and US President Barack Obama held bilateral talks in New York on the sidelines of the 71st session of the UN General Assembly on Tuesday.

NAN had reported exclusively about the meeting which was not listed in President Buhari’s itinerary in New York. But the White House announced the meeting, a valedictory of sort for President Obama, who is attending his eighth and last session of the UN General Assembly.

Buhari also later met with President Francois Hollande of France for similar bilateral talks.

On Monday, President Buhari also met with South African leader, Jacob Zuma.

Also on Monday, President Muhammadu Buhari and other world leaders  adopted the New York Declaration for refugees and migrants.

The declaration expresses the political will of world leaders to protect the rights of refugees and migrants, to save lives and share responsibility for large movements on global scale.

The UN Secretary-General, Ban Ki-moon, while congratulating member states for adopting the declaration, said “today’s summit represents a breakthrough in our collective efforts to address the challenges of human mobility.”

He said that the adoption would mean that more children could now attend school, more workers could securely seek jobs abroad, instead of being at the mercy of criminal smugglers, and more people would have real choices about whether to move during conflicts, sustain peace and increase opportunities at home.

Mr Peter Thomson, the President of the UN General Assembly (UNGA), said “I will take forward the commitment of the membership to begin a process that will lead to a global compact on migration, as well as to support a global compact on refugees.