UNITED NATIONS, Jul 1 (IPS) - After several rounds of intense eleventh-hour negotiations last week over the structure and composition of a proposed new "gender entity" and its executive board, the United Nations has cleared the last of the remaining political hurdles towards the creation of a separate and distinct U.N. agency for women.

The Lancet (Volume 374, Issue 9695) - Women's rights advocates were jubilant last week when, after 3 years of negotiations, the UN General Assembly voted to create a new UN agency for women. The resolution, passed by the 192 UN member states, calls for the merger of the organisation's four existing offices dedicated to women's issues: the UN Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM), the Office of the Special Adviser on Gender Issues and the Advancement of Women, the Division for the Advancement of Women, and the UN International Research and Training Institute for the Advancement of Women. It states that the new agency is to be led by an Under-Secretary General who would report directly to the Secretary-General. And it calls on the Secretary-General, Ban Ki-moon, to produce a comprehensive proposal for the new agency to be considered at the 64th UN General Assembly (Sept 23—30).

Last week, the United Nations consolidated four agencies that tackle women's issues and created a new super agency. Humanitarian workers around the world embraced the move. It was about time, they said, that the world got serious about how half its population lives.