United Nations

Fariba, a young Afghan woman, had just begun a university degree in 2021 when the Taliban returned to power and banned women and girls from secondary and higher education.  

Two former leaders of the predominantly Christian Anti-Balaka militia in the Central African Republic have been convicted of multiple war crimes and crimes against humanity by the International Criminal Court (ICC).

In a dramatic escalation of a long-standing border dispute, a deadly exchange of fire between Thailand and Cambodia killed at least 11 civilians and a soldier on Thursday, according to news reports. Both states are claiming the other side fired first.

After nearly three decades on the frontlines of UN’s peace operations – from Timor-Leste’s turbulent independence referendum to Western Sahara’s protracted ceasefire and Cyprus’ frozen conflict – Colin Stewart is leaving the Organization with his faith in it intact.

The High-Level Political Forum on Sustainable Development (HLPF) has concluded at United Nations Headquarters in New York following a week-and-a-half of substantive discussion between Member States, civil society representatives and UN agencies.   

“People in Gaza are neither dead nor alive, they are walking corpses.” 

Amid growing geopolitical turbulence, the United Nations is deepening its collaboration with the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) to help address some of the world’s most complex and protracted conflicts, from Gaza and Sudan to Myanmar and Afghanistan.

Afghans returning to their country face “serious violations” of their human rights committed by the Taliban de facto authorities, according to a United Nations report published on Thursday amid mass deportation campaigns from Iran and Pakistan.

Nations are pursuing underwater exploration for highly sought-after rare earth minerals, but the head of the UN’s International Seabed Authority (ISA) said the deep-sea belongs to no single country or corporation as efforts are underway to ensure this rich resource will not become “the Wild West” of exploitation.

A second convoy from the Syrian Arab Red Crescent (SARC) reached battered Sweida on Wednesday, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) reported in its latest update. 

Escalating gang violence and displacement continue to drive humanitarian needs in Haiti, the UN said on Wednesday.

At a time of escalating violence and record levels of hunger in Nigeria, critical funding shortfalls are forcing the UN World Food Program (WFP) to suspend all emergency food and nutrition aid for 1.3 million people in the northeast of the country.

When Denis Jobin, a senior evaluation specialist at the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF), visited a slum in Kenya in March as part of an ongoing evaluation, the smell was overwhelming.  

The International Court of Justice (ICJ) in The Hague, Netherlands, issued its advisory opinion on the obligations of States in respect of climate change, read out by the President of the Court, Judge Iwasawa Yuji, on Wednesday. 

A senior UN official on Wednesday urged the Security Council to push for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza and the release of all hostages, warning that the war has become “a nightmare of historic proportions” and it is “long past time” for the fighting to end and for hostages to return home.

Pregnant women and newborns in Gaza face “catastrophic” conditions, including a dysfunctional healthcare system, psychological stress and food deprivation, the UN reproductive health agency UNFPA reported on Wednesday. 

The Security Council meets today for its quarterly open debate on the situation in the Middle East, with a focus on the worsening crisis in Gaza. UN Assistant Secretary-General Khaled Khiari is expected to brief on the situation in the war-ravaged enclave where food entry and distribution remain severely restricted, malnutrition is rising and fuel and shelter supplies are critically scarce. UN News, in coordination with UN Meetings Coverage, brings you live updates from today’s discussions. UN News app users can follow here.

The Security Council on Tuesday adopted a resolution urging all Member States to “utilise effectively” the mechanisms for the pacific settlement of disputes as outlined in the United Nations Charter, including “negotiation, enquiry, mediation, conciliation, arbitration, judicial settlement” and other peaceful means of their choice.

The chief economist of the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), Máximo Torero Cullen, previewed its annual State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World (SOFI) report in a briefing on Tuesday to journalists at UN Headquarters in New York.

As the humanitarian crisis deepens in Sudan, the UN and partners have revised and scaled up a response plan to support more than 380,000 displaced people in Tawila, North Darfur state.