Page 23 - United Nations

UN warns 6 mn Afghans at risk of famine, urges donors to restore funding

Warning that Afghanistan faces deepening poverty with 6 million people at risk of famine, the U.N. humanitarian chief on Monday urged donors to restore funding for economic development and immediately provide $770 million to help Afghans get through the winter as the United States argued with Russia and China over who should pay. Martin Griffiths told the U.N. Security Council that Afghanistan faces multiple crises -- humanitarian, economic, climate, hunger and financial. Conflict, poverty, climate shocks and food insecurity have long been a sad reality in Afghanistan, but he said what makes the current situation so critical is the halt to large-scale development aid since the Taliban takeover a year ago. More than half the Afghan population -- some 24 million people -- need assistance and close to 19 million are facing acute levels of food insecurity, Griffiths said. And we worry that the figures will soon become worse because winter weather will send already high fuel and food ..

Lt Gen Subramanian takes command of UN's largest peacekeeping operation

The operation, known as UN Mission in South Sudan (UNMISS) has 13,254 troops among its 17,982 personnel, of whom, 2,385 troops and 30 police personnel are from India

Over 40,000 mt of wheat dispatched to Afghanistan so far: India at UN

The country is currently battered by the deepening economic, humanitarian, and security crisis following the Taliban takeover

UN Chief Guterres urges world to put nuclear test ban treaty into force

The resolution was initiated to commemorate the closure of the Semipalatinsk nuclear test site in Kazakhstan on August 29, 1991

Afghans run out of patience amid degrading humanitarian state: UN official

Taliban regime in 2021 resulted in a deepening economic and humanitarian crisis. Natural disasters also added to the suffering of the Afghan people

Centre submits NDC climate target to UNFCC, eyes net-zero by 2070

No Sectoral Targets, 500 GW renewable energy target also dropped

Russia blocks final document at nuclear treaty conference with UN

Russia late Friday blocked agreement on the final document of a four-week review of the UN treaty considered the cornerstone of nuclear disarmament which criticized its military takeover of Europe's largest nuclear plant soon after Russian troops invaded Ukraine, an act that has raised fears of a nuclear accident. Igor Vishnevetsky, deputy director of the Russian Foreign Ministry's Non-Proliferation and Arms Control Department, told the delayed final meeting of the conference reviewing the 50-year-old Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty that "unfortunately there is no consensus on this document." He insisted that many countries not just Russia didn't agree with "a whole host of issues" in the 36-page last draft. The document needed approval by all 191 countries that are parties to the treaty aimed at curbing the spread of nuclear weapons and ultimately achieving a world without them. Argentine Ambassador Gustavo Zlauvinen, president of the conference, said the final draft represented

UN nuclear treaty conference ends with Ukraine's nuclear plant in spotlight

As 191 countries approach Friday's end to a four-week conference to review the landmark U.N. treaty aimed at curbing the spread of nuclear weapons, Russia's invasion of Ukraine and takeover of Europe's largest nuclear power plant and rivalries between the West and China were posing key obstacles to agreement on a final document. Argentine Ambassador Gustavo Zlauvinen, president of the conference reviewing the 50-year-old Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, which is considered the cornerstone of nuclear disarmament, circulated a 35-page draft final document on Thursday. After listening to objections from countries at a closed-door session, diplomats said he was planning to revise the document for a final closed-door discussion Friday morning, ahead of an open meeting in the afternoon to end the conference. Any document must be approved by all parties to the treaty and it's uncertain whether an agreement will be reached before the conference ends. There is a possibility that only a brief

UN rights commissioner slams pressure over Xinjiang report on China

UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet expressed criticism at the pressure she is under over publishing a report into the human rights situation in China's Xinjiang region

UN chief urges Ethiopia and Tigray leaders to 'immediately' halt fighting

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Thursday urged Ethiopia's prime minister and the leader of its restive Tigray region to immediately halt the latest eruption of hostilities, which has set back efforts to restore peace and tackle a humanitarian crisis in Tigray. Guterres also called for "the creation of conditions to restart an effective political dialogue" in separate phone calls with Ethiopian leader Abiy Ahmed and Debretsion Gebremichael, head of the Tigray People's Liberation Front, UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric said. Tigray authorities alleged Wednesday that Ethiopia's military had launched a "large-scale" offensive for the first time in a year in Tigray, while the government countered that Tigray forces attacked first. The conflict began in November 2020, killing thousands of people in Africa's second-most populous country. Now, as then, both sides have acted at a moment when the world was focused elsewhere the US presidential election in 2020 and the six-month mark o

Rohingya must be part of Myanmar's political crisis solution: UN chief

Secretary-General Antonio Guterres called on Myanmar's military-installed government Wednesday to include ethnic Rohingya in a solution to the country's political crisis. He commented on the eve of the fifth anniversary of the start of a mass exodus by the Muslim minority to Bangladesh to escape a military crackdown in Myanmar's northern Rakhine state. UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric said Guterres noted "the unflagging aspirations for an inclusive future" for the Rohingya, who face widespread discrimination in Buddhist-majority Myanmar. Most are denied citizenship and many other rights. The long-simmering conflict with the Rohingya exploded on August 25, 2017, when Myanmar's military launched what it called a clearance campaign in Rakhine in response to attacks on police and border guards by a Rohingya militant group. More than 700,000 Rohingya fled to Bangladesh as troops allegedly committed mass rapes and killings and burned thousands of homes. In January 2020, the International .

India breaks streak of UN abstentions on Ukraine, votes against Russia

Breaking its streak of abstentions on votes related to Ukraine, India has voted for a procedural matter that Russia opposed at the UN Security Council

UNSC: India to dispatch 12th consignment of humanitarian aid to Ukraine

India on Wednesday announced that it is ready to dispatch its 12th consignment of humanitarian aid to Ukraine consisting of twenty-six types of medicines on the special request of the Ukrainian side.Addressing a United Nations Security Council briefing, the country's Permanent Representative to the UN, Ruchira Kamboj said that the humanitarian aid includes 'hemostatic bandages' which are meant to stem the bleeding of deep wounds in children and adults and are included in the aid on the specific request by the Ukrainian side as the members meet to mark 6 months since the beginning of the ongoing conflict in Ukraine.This comes as the Ukrainian authorities by requested assistance from the govt of India to tackle the looming crisis in the country."We have delivered for the world in terms of vaccines. We did it earlier for medicines. So, I'd like to assure this council that India will step forward whenever the global south is constrained on aspects of food, health & energy security,"

Moscow again accuses UN of blocking nuclear experts from Zaporizhzhya plant

Russia's Foreign Ministry has once again accused the United Nations of blocking a mission of experts to the Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhya nuclear power plant in southern Ukraine

India warns UN may face oblivion without reforms to make it relevant

India has been pushing for reforming the Council and staked a claim to a permanent seat in the restructured body

Owing to international pressure US to discuss over frozen funds to Kabul

The United Nations has highlighted that nearly half the country's 40 million people face acute hunger and are on the brink of starvation

UN chief calls for global consensus on cooperation for collective security

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has stressed the need to reforge a global consensus around the cooperation required to ensure collective security

United Nations arms treaty an example, not an answer, says Owen Greene

United Nations arms treaty an example, not an answer

US buying 150,000 metric tonnes of Ukraine grain for hungry regions: UN

The United States is stepping up to buy about 150,000 metric tons of grain from Ukraine in the next few weeks for an upcoming shipment of food aid from ports no longer blockaded by war, the World Food Program chief has told The Associated Press. The final destinations for the grain are not confirmed and discussions continue, David Beasley said. But the planned shipment, one of several the UN agency that fights hunger is pursuing, is more than six times the amount of grain that the first WFP-arranged ship from Ukraine is now carrying toward people in the Horn of Africa at risk of starvation. Beasley spoke Friday from northern Kenya, which is deep in a drought that is withering the Horn of Africa region. He sat under a thorn tree among local women who told the AP that the last time it rained was in 2019. Their bone-dry communities face yet another failed rainy season within weeks that could tip parts of the region, especially neighbouring Somalia, into famine. Already, thousands of ..

Divided UN council down to wire on travel exemptions for Taliban officials

The divided UN Security Council failed to reach agreement on whether to extend travel exemptions for 13 Taliban officials now ruling Afghanistan as they expired at midnight on Friday. UN diplomats said Russia and China want to allow all 13 to continue to travel while the US and Western nations are determined to cut the number to protest the Taliban's rollback of women's rights and failure to form an inclusive government as it promised. Russia and China asked for more time on Friday evening to consider the latest US proposal, the Security Council diplomats said, speaking on condition of anonymity because discussions have been private. So, the travel ban will be restored on all 13 Taliban officials until Monday afternoon at the earliest when Russia and China must now respond to the US proposal. Dozens of Taliban members have been on the UN sanctions blacklist for years, subject to a travel ban, asset freeze and arms embargo. But some Taliban officials were granted waivers so they cou