An interesting report named “Illicit financial flows, human rights and the post-2015 development agenda” has been submitted to the Human Rights Council on 9 March 2015 under the agenda item “Promotion and protection of all human rights, civil, in political, economic, social and cultural rights, including the right to development”.

The report outlines how illicit financial flows undermine the enjoyment of economic, social, cultural, civil and political rights and emphasizes the need for political action.

The UN Statistical Commission discussed the challenges of the Post-2015 Development Agenda. This included implementation, measuring or monitoring progress as well as accountability. This includes a pragmatic look at the available data and implications for the Sustainable Development Goal indicators. Linkages between different agendas being negotiated in parallel such as Financing for Development, Post-2015 and Climate were starkly noticeable.

The 46th session of the Statistical Commission was held at the United Nations Headquarters, New York from 3 to 6 March 2015. The Commission attempted to tackle the issue of data in support of the post-2015 development agenda.

The UN Statistical Commission concluded its meeting in New York last March 6 without agreeing on a list of indicators to measure the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The body is composed of 24 governments and it oversees the work of the UN statistical Division, the most important global agency on world indicators, in charge, among other things of defining how GDP is conceptualized and counted.

A preliminary list of indicators compiled from the suggestions of expert groups was deemed premature by the Commission, and instead a roadmap for the development and implementation of the indicator framework by the next Commission in 2016 was endorsed.

The United Nations negotiations on the Post-2015 Development Agenda in New York saw Member States inching towards a political Declaration amidst considerable differences.

The Declaration is to lay the broader framework on which the more specific elements of the Agenda will rest in a separate outcome document. These will be adopted at the UN Summit on 25-27 September tilted "Delivering on and Implementing a Transformative Post-2015 Development Agenda".

As the discussion on the Declaration of the Post-2015 Development Agenda gets underway, differences between developing and developed countries that are likely to loom over the rest of the Post-2015 negotiations became clearer.

The draft political Declaration is to set the framework for the Post-2015 development agenda and spell out the broader common principles, commitments and objectives that the agenda is founded on.