News

Amidst a “critical shortage” of resources, hundreds of thousands of refugees in Kenya will lack food unless new funds are swiftly received, the UN’s food relief agency warned on Thursday. 

Thousands of families in the United Kingdom impacted by COVID-19 are to receive “one-off…emergency” food assistance from UN Children’s Fund UNICEF over the upcoming holiday period and beyond, it has announced.

Equitable distribution of COVID-19 vaccines will represent an “acid test” for the international community, the President of the UN Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) told journalists on Wednesday, highlighting the importance of global cooperation and solidarity in beating back the disease. 

The ceasefire that halted Libya’s civil war in October has begun to pay economic dividends that should improve living standards for ordinary Libyans, with a first central bank board meeting in five years and a full resumption of oil production helping to build momentum for political change.

As the end of another year of war looms, “families in Syria remain without respite after almost a decade of conflict”, the UN Emergency Relief Coordinator told the Security Council on Wednesday.

New Desert Locust swarms are forming in the Horn of Africa, threatening agricultural livelihoods and food security of millions of people, the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) has warned. 

Providing aid to millions of children uprooted by the ongoing crisis in the Tigray region of Ethiopia must be a priority, the head of the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) said on Tuesday. 

An Indian engineer has been recognized by the United Nations for developing innovative technology which not only produces energy, but which helps to keep the air cleaner and reduce climate change.

Countries must redesign their development pathways to reduce pressures exerted on the environment and the natural world, or risk stalling humanity’s progress, the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) has cautioned. 

The number of fish stocks subject to overexploitation in the Mediterranean and Black Sea has fallen for the first time in decades, offering some hope that a dangerous decline can be turned around, according to a report published on Monday by the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO).

Live coverage of the Climate Ambition Summit 2020, an important step forward in the battle against the climate crisis, with several major economies announcing new commitments to cut their carbon footprints and reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

Amidst “disturbing reports” from Ethiopians fleeing to Sudan, the UN refugee agency called on Friday for “unfettered access to Tigray in order to reach people in need”. 

Although many of the world’s most important crops and livestock species originate in mountain regions, hunger is rising in these areas due to biodiversity loss and climate change, according to a joint study published on Friday by the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and partners. 

UN humanitarians issued a fresh alert on Friday for war-torn Yemen, warning that time is running out to avoid famine in the country. Out of two million children who need treatment for acute malnutrition, 360,000 are at risk of dying if they do not receive medical care, the World Food Programme (WFP) said.

The UN Children’s Fund, UNICEF, slams the levels of financial support for children allocated by high-income countries during the pandemic as totally inadequate, in a child poverty report issued on Friday.

With 270 million people – more than the entire population of Western Europe – “marching toward starvation”, the head of the World Food Programme (WFP) called for greater action to avert a “hunger pandemic”, in accepting the Nobel Peace Prize on behalf of the UN agency on Thursday. 

Despite a brief dip in global carbon dioxide emissions as a result of the coronavirus pandemic, the planet is still heading for a global temperature rise in excess of 3 degrees Celsius this century, a new United Nations report has revealed. 

The UN’s Central Emergency Response Fund (CERF) which responds to crises around the world, consistently delivers “principled, coordinated, fast and agile” humanitarian action, the UN chief said on Monday, appealing for hundreds of millions of dollars for the year ahead. 

Developing countries are building more ambitious plans to tackle climate change, with COVID-19 stimulus packages often serving as a springboard towards a greener recovery, the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) said on Tuesday.

As COVID-19 continues to disproportionately impact women and girls hit by multiple humanitarian crises, the UN sexual and reproductive health agency appealed on Monday for $818 million to provide 54 million women and youth with essential and life-saving services throughout 2021. 

The UN Secretary-General said on Monday it was “essential to quickly restore the rule of law” in Ethiopia’s northern region of Tigray, where Government forces and those loyal to the ruling Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) have been engaged in fighting for more than a month.

The United Nations is commemorating the International Civil Aviation Day on Monday, highlighting the importance of the sector in lifting the world to recovery from the coronavirus pandemic. 

The UN’s humanitarian coordination office, said on Friday that it was doing its utmost to secure aid access to Ethiopia’s Tigray region, after a deal was struck to reach displaced civilians, following weeks of fighting between federal and regional forces.

The Pacific island nation of Vanuatu has graduated from the status of least developed countries (LDC), becoming the sixth ever country to achieve the milestone, since the category was created in 1971. 

UN experts called on the Security Council on Thursday, along with the international community at large, to put an end to the “surreal and absurd dimension” of human rights violations engulfing war-torn Yemen, where abuses continue unchecked.    

The UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) on Thursday, launched a $6.4 billion emergency funding appeal to reach more than 190 million children affected by humanitarian crises amidst the coronavirus pandemic. 

More than 32 million of the world’s poorest people face being pulled back into extreme poverty because of COVID-19, leading UN economists said on Thursday, highlighting data showing that the pandemic is likely to cause the worst economic crisis in decades among least developed countries (LDCs). 

An additional 207 million people could be pushed into extreme poverty by severe long term impact of the coronavirus pandemic – bringing the total number to more than 1 billion – by 2030, a new study from the UN Development Programme (UNDP) has found. 

The UN on Friday announced that agreement has been reached with the Ethiopian Government to allow “unimpeded, sustained and secure access” for humanitarian supplies to reach those in need across areas now under its control in Tigray.