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Pursuant to General Assembly resolution , the Economic and Social Council held a one-day meeting on “External debt sustainability and development: Lessons learned from debt crises and ongoing work on sovereign debt restructuring and debt resolution mechanisms”. Following a short opening plenary featuring remarks by the President of ECOSOC, Secretary-General of UNCTAD and the Assistant Secretary-General for Economic Development of DESA, senior panellists from the World Bank and academia discussed lessons learned from the history of debt crises. Subsequently, UNCTAD and DESA provided briefings on the ongoing work on sovereign debt restructuring and debt resolution mechanisms, followed by an interactive discussion.

The afternoon session featured a keynote address by Prof. Joseph Stiglitz, entitled “Gaps in legal and institutional structures for debt restructuring”. It was followed by a panel discussion on the “Architecture for debt restructuring” and an interactive discussion.

At the closing of the meeting, the President of ECOSOC made concluding remarks highlighting key points and common messages.