Foreign Secretary Shanker Das Bairagi held a meeting with Director General of the World Trade Organization Roberto Azevêdo in Geneva on Friday. 

Secretary Bairagi stressed the need for building proper balance between trade 

and development at the meeting, according to a statement issued by Nepal’s Permanent Mission to the United Nations in Geneva. 

Highlighting that all countries should be able to win from the world trading system, Bairagi said there should be a system of wide support for the LDCs as they have been unable to fully utilise the special and differential provisions of the WTO regime. 

There is a capacity gap in them and they must be enabled so that there is a delivery in the ground on the LDC specific provisions of the WTO rules, Secretary Bairagi said.

 Roberto said that his role as the WTO director general was to facilitate that LDCs benefit from the system and request the WTO member states to engage themselves and move forward the WTO process. 

Secretary Bairagi also held a meeting with Deputy High Commissioner for Human Rights Kate Gilmore on the sidelines of the 37th session of Human Rights Council. 

At the meeting, he highlighted the achievements made by Nepal in the field of human rights over the years and stressed that Nepal has remained constructively engaged with the UN human rights machinery. 

The Deputy High Commissioner congratulated Nepal’s election to the Human Rights Council and wished for a success in the Council. She said that OHCHR would be supportive to the wider reach out of Nepal’s achievements in the field of human rights.