'Unseen' News and Views – By Baher Kamal & The Like
Joint Statement by the Special Representative of the Secretary-General on Sexual Violence in Conflict, Pramila Patten, and Assistant Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Deputy Emergency Relief Coordinator, Joyce Msuya:
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Undertake Prompt, Independent Inquiry with AU, UN Assistance
(Nairobi) – The Burkina Faso military summarily executed at least 223 civilians, including at least 56 children, in two villages on February 25, 2024, Human Rights Watch said today [25 April 2024].
These mass killings, among the worst army abuse in Burkina Faso since 2015, appear to be part of a widespread military campaign against civilians accused of collaborating with Islamist armed groups, and may amount to crimes against humanity.
“It is like living in a greenhouse, no-one can tolerate living inside,” the UN agency said, quoting Mustafa Radwan, formerly from Gaza City, in a social media post on X.
Rome, 24 April 2024 (FAO)* – According to the latest Global Report on Food Crises (GRFC), nearly 282 million people in 59 countries and territories experienced high levels of acute hunger in 2023 – a worldwide increase of 24 million from the previous year.
Livestock-holding farmers and herders in Rafah, Gaza Strip, receive animal fodder distributed by FAO to support local food production in April 2024. ©FAO / Yousef Alrozzi
This rise was due to the report’s increased coverage of food crisis contexts as well as a sharp deterioration in food security, especially in the Gaza Strip and the Sudan.
The Right of the Jewish People to the Land of Israel (Eretz Israel)
(UN News)* — The Security Council rejected Palestine’s request for UN membership on Thursday [], with the United States casting a veto.
In a vote of 12 in favour to one against, with two abstentions, the Council did not adopt a draft resolution that would have recommended the General Assembly to hold a vote with the broader UN membership to allow Palestine to join as a full UN Member State.
The draft resolution is among the shortest in the Council’s history: “The Security Council, having examined the application of the State of Palestine for admission to the United Nations (S/2011/592), recommends to the General Assembly that the State of Palestine be admitted to membership in the United Nations.”
Mahmoud Abbas (centre right), President of the State of Palestine, addresses an event to commemorate the 75th Anniversary of the Nakba, held by the Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People on 15 May 2023.
But one lingering question remains: will the two-state solution include– or exclude– Palestine as a full-fledged UN member state? Continue reading
Fawzya*, 26, was travelling towards the border with Chad to escape the violence that had engulfed her hometown in Sudan, when fighting broke out just in front of her.
(UN News)* — The year-long ongoing war in Sudan is “a crisis of epic proportions”, and the world must rethink the way it supports the Sudanese people amid rampant atrocities against civilians and no end in sight, top UN and African Union officials warned the Security Council on Friday [].
The Sudanese people have endured “unbearable suffering” since the conflict started just over a year ago when an outbreak of fighting between the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) “brutally interrupted the political transition”, Rosemary DiCarlo, UN Under-Secretary-General for Political and Peacebuilding Affairs, said.
(UN News)* — Climate change shocks caused record levels of disruption and misery for millions in Europe in 2023 with widespread flooding and severe heatwaves – a new normal which countries must adapt to as a priority, the UN weather agency said on Monday [].
© UNOCHA/Giles Clarke | A mother helps her child to study at the Delmas 4 Olympique Boxing Arena where they are now sheltering.
(UN News)* — UN-coordinated food convoys are three times more likely to be denied access to north Gaza than other aid convoys, the UN humanitarian affairs office, OCHA, reported on Tuesday [9 April 2024].
Israeli authorities have not given a clear reason why, said OCHA Spokesperson Jens Laerke, speaking during the regular briefing by UN humanitarian agencies in Geneva.
“They very often deny and that is it, and it ends there. We do not get an explanation,” he said.
‘Fear and loss’ multiplies in Sudan exodus
Thousands more are arriving by the day, agency spokesperson Olga Sarrado told journalists at the regular news briefing in Geneva.
(UN News)* — The President of the UN General Assembly appealed on Monday [8 April 2024] for “all those with leverage” to use their power to bring an end to the six-month-long war in Gaza.
© WHO | A group of children get together in Rafah, in the south of the Gaza strip.
Dennis Francis convened the UN’s most representative body, comprising all 193 Member States, following the Security Council’s failure to adopt a resolution put forward by the United States last month.
The debate was triggered by a 2022 Assembly resolution that calls for a meeting to be held within 10 working days whenever a veto is cast in the Council.
– Developing countries are being blamed for having borrowed and spent irresponsibly. But they have only been doing what foreign powers and financial interests have urged them to do.
Ndongo Samba Sylla
Since the 2008 global financial crisis, developing nations have been told to borrow massively from private finance, even at exorbitant interest rates, to scale funding up ‘from billions to trillions’.
With progress towards sustainable development often in reverse, servicing external debt now blocks progress. Many governments have cut back spending in line with conditions or advice from powerful foreign economic agencies.
Current account tales
Many still believe all national economies should have trade or current account surpluses with others – typically citing Germany’s and Japan’s post-war booms. But of course, not all countries can have surpluses simultaneously.
How UNFPA helps mothers around the world embrace their right to good health and safe pregnancy
UNITED NATIONS, New York, 5 April 2024 (UNFPA)* -– Everyone has the right to health; and for women and girls, one aspect of this fundamental promise is the right to safe motherhood.
Yet every two minutes, a woman or girl still dies due to pregnancy or childbirth, with the vast majority of these tragedies preventable.
“I thought I was going to lose my baby and die on the journey to hospital.”
The chilling words of Samueline Razafindravao, who had to make the harrowing hours-long trip to the nearest specialist hospital in Ambovombe town in the Androy region of southern Madagascar after it became clear she might lose her child if she did not seek urgent medical attention.
Minuscule amount is less than 12% of the average daily calorie needs
The destruction was caused by the Israeli airstrikes in Al Remal neighbourhood in the middle of Gaza City during the 4th day of the escalation | Source: OXFAM: https://www.oxfam.org/en/what-we-do/emergencies/gaza-crisis-appeal.
(OXFAM)* 3 April 2024 — People in northern Gaza have been forced to survive on an average of 245 calories a day – less than a can of fava beans – since January, as Israeli forces continue their military onslaught. Over 300,000 people are believed to still be trapped there, unable to leave.
(UN News)* — In April 1994, a sinister call was broadcast over radio stations across Rwanda, triggering the start of 100 days of genocide that left more than one million people dead. Henriette Mutegwaraba heard that call.
UN Photo/Loey Felipe | Henriette Mutegwaraba, survivor of the genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda and founder of the Million Lives Genocide relief fund, addresses the commemoration of the International Day of Reflection on the 1994 Genocide.
“Every time I talk about it, I cry,” she told UN News, describing how propaganda spread messages of hate that sparked a deadly wave of unspeakable violence. She lost 60 family members and friends in the mass slaughter. Continue reading
(UN News)* — With the largest hospital in Gaza largely destroyed and out of action, access to healthcare has now become “totally inadequate” following six months of brutal fighting between Israeli forces and Palestinian militants, said the World Health Organization (WHO) on Saturday [].
UNRWA IS THE UNITED NATIONS RELIEF AND WORKS AGENCY FOR REGISTERED PALESTINIAN REFUGEES
Displaced Palestinians preparing food to break the fastin the centre of Deir al-Balah, Middle Areas, Gaza Strip, April 2024 @ 2024 UNRWA Photo by Ashraf Amra
Following the 1948 War between Israel and Arab neighbors, UNRWA was established by United Nations General Assembly Resolution 302 (IV) on December 8th, 1949 to carry out direct relief and works programmes for Palestine refugees. The Agency began operations on May 1st, 1950. Continue reading
(UN News)* — Some of Haiti’s gangs have bigger arsenals than the police as criminal groups are becoming “stronger, richer and more autonomous” by using arms trafficking to fuel their growth, according to UN experts.
UNODC | Firearms confiscated during border checks.
(UN News)* — The destruction wrought across the Gaza Strip by Israel in the six months since the massacre of Israeli and other citizens by Hamas on 7 October 2023 makes for grim reading – over 33,000 people killed and, according to the World Bank, over one million Palestinians are without homes, close to 90 per cent of health facilities have been damaged or wrecked and schools have been destroyed or turned into shelters for the newly homeless.
(UN News)* — Aid officials called on the Security Council on Friday [] to step in to stop the carnage in Gaza as the war enters its sixth month amid a man-made famine, Israel’s constant bombardment, targeted killings of aid workers and Palestinians civilians and “zero accountability” for the perpetrators.
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Briefing the Council on the current situation on the ground, Ramesh Rajasingham, coordination director with UN humanitarian affairs office, OCHA, and Janti Soeripto of the non-governmental organisation (NGO) Save the Children, outlined the latest impact of the devastation that has followed the Hamas-led terror attack on Israel last October, which left more than 1,200 people dead and more than 240 taken hostage.
United Nations, Geneva
The UN is studying plans to close the Palais des Nations beginning 22 April. Only conferences would run, but some of the offices would shut.
In the earlier cutbacks, some of the Geneva offices remained closed or partially closed from 20 December last year to 12 January 2024. Continue reading
Ameenah Gurib-Fakim, PhD, Former President of the Republic of Mauritius
Dr. Ameenah Gurib-Fakim
– The title of this piece is not mine.
It’s from the President of Turkiye calling for a reform of the United Nations Security Council.
It has since become a motto in the UN reform campaign encapsulating the shared resentment at a global system that gives the five Permanent members – The P5 of the UN Security Council – the United States, France, Britain, China and Russia – unfair and often destructive veto powers that undermines the very ideals for which the UN was established. Continue reading
(UN News)* — Almost five million Haitians are going hungry and need food assistance, according to recent UN figures, but the violence and related insecurity created by heavily armed rival gangs operating mainly in the capital are posing more questions about how to make sure those beleaguered people get enough to eat, now and in the future.
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WFP Haiti/Theresa Piorr | Farmers in the south of Haiti are struggling to get their goods to markets
(UN News)* — Israeli forces are blocking aid deliveries into famine-stricken northern Gaza as the five-month-long war grinds on despite recent strong demands from the top UN court and the Security Council for open aid access into the enclave and for a temporary ceasefire and the return of all hostages taken in October, as the UN plans an assessment mission into Al-Shifa Hospital, which had been occupied by Israeli troops for two weeks.
When improperly managed, much of that refuse—from food and plastics to electronics and textiles—emits greenhouse gases or poisonous chemicals.
This damages ecosystems, inflicts disease and threatens economic prosperity, disproportionately harming women and youth.
On 30 March, the world will mark the International Day of Zero Waste.
(UNRWA)* — Alaa is a young teenager from the Zaytoun neighborhood in the Gaza Strip. She and her family, along with most of the population in Gaza, have been displaced to Rafah, all searching for safety from Israeli bombardments.
Living in the Rubble: Alaa’s Harrowing Story of Displacement
Rafah is now overrun with internally displaced people (IDPs) seeking shelter. Home to only 300,000 people before the start of the war, it now hosts some 1.5 million Palestinians.
Alaa’s story of displacement, fear, and sadness is shared by hundreds of thousands of other children.
PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haïti, 28 March 2024 (UNFPA)* -– The National Institute for Midwifery in Haïti’s capital usually trains around 80 midwives per year, who go on to help thousands of pregnant women deliver their babies safely.
But when armed gangs stormed and looted the institute in Port-au-Prince at the end of February, students and staff fled in terror; many are not sure if or when they will ever be able to return.
With the latest alarming upsurge in gang violence, health facilities are coming under near-constant attack, stripped of their equipment, medicine and even ambulances.
Nairobi, 27 March 2024 (UNEP)* -– Households across all continents wasted over 1 billion meals a day in 2022, while 783 million people were affected by hunger and a third of humanity faced food insecurity.
Food waste continues to hurt the global economy and fuel climate change, nature loss, and pollution. These are the key findings of a UN Environment Programme (UNEP) report published today, ahead of the International Day of Zero Waste.
MARCH 28TH, 2024 (UNDP)* — The war in Gaza led to a dire humanitarian condition, profoundly affecting the lives of its 2.2 million people – loss of life, property and desperate need of food, dignified shelter and medical care.
(UN News)* — Sudan, and Darfur in particular, are facing a humanitarian and security crisis after a war broke out in April 2023 between the Sudanese army and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF), although ethnic conflicts in Darfur date back more than two decades.
Fatima*, a resident of the city of El Geneina in West Darfur state, where thousands of people have been reportedly killed, escaped with her family across the border as rival militias battled for control of her city.
“We were trapped inside our house for more than 57 days while militias systematically targeted and killed people based on their ethnicity. They did not spare women, children or elders.
(UN News)* — Immediate and bold action is required to tackle the “cataclysmic” situation in Haiti, the UN human rights office, OHCHR, said in a report issued on Thursday [28 March 2024].
© CAPAC/Jean Vadler Presume | Children in Haiti line up for a hot meal and water distributed by the World Food Programme (WFP) in Port-au-Prince.
Corruption, impunity and poor governance, compounded by increasing levels of gang violence, have eroded the rule of law in the Caribbean country and brought state institutions close to collapse.
The impact of generalised insecurity on the population is dire and deteriorating, severely affecting human rights. Continue reading
(UN News)* — There are “reasonable grounds” to believe that Israel is committing genocide against Palestinians in Gaza, the UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Occupied Palestinian Territories said on Tuesday [26 March 2024].
Francesca Albanese was speaking at the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva, where she presented her latest report, entitled ‘Anatomy of a Genocide’, during an interactive dialogue with Member States.
“Following nearly six months of unrelenting Israeli assault on occupied Gaza, it is my solemn duty to report on the worst of what humanity is capable of, and to present my findings,” she said.
(UN News)* — Intense hostilities in Gaza continued on Tuesday [] between Hamas fighters and Israeli forces with a “double-digit number of children killed overnight” and ongoing aid delivery obstacles that are responsible for near-famine conditions, UN humanitarians said.
Children eating and drinking at the Children’s House in Idlib. Abandoned children is a growing issue in the region. Credit: Sonia Al-Ali/IPS
He was returning from work on December 10, 2023. He stopped momentarily, turned on his mobile phone flashlight to investigate, and spotted a baby girl, around one month old, wrapped in a white blanket, lying by the roadside.
A new report from the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC) has laid bare the devastating environmental and economic consequences of the unlawful discharge of untreated wastewater from Israeli settlements into Palestinian lands in the occupied West Bank.
In both sites researched for the report, wastewater, including human sewage and animal waste, flowing from illegal Israeli settlements for long distances has damaged crops and knocked agricultural Palestinian lands out of use.
Geneva/Berlin, 26 March 2024 (IOM)* –- As the International Organization for Migration’s (IOM) Missing Migrants Project marks its ten-year milestone, a new report reveals alarming trends in migrant deaths and disappearances over the past decade.
More than one-third of deceased migrants whose country of origin could be identified come from countries in conflict or with large refugee populations, highlighting the dangers faced by those attempting to flee conflict zones without safe pathways.
(UN News)* — Conflict in Yemen entered its 10th year on Monday [], as UN humanitarians issued a warning that over half the country’s populations are in desperate need of aid.
You also need safe toilets to keep the environment clean, and as well as soap and water to stop the spread of disease.
Find out more about why safe water, sanitation and hygiene are so important:
(UN News)* — Israeli authorities informed the United Nations on Sunday [] that it will no longer approve the passage of any UN agency for Palestine refugees, UNRWA, food convoys into northern Gaza.
“As of today, UNRWA, the main lifeline for Palestine refugees, is denied from providing lifesaving assistance to northern Gaza,” UNRWA Commissioner-General Philippe Lazzarini wrote in a social media post on X.
He called the decision “outrageous”, saying it was made to intentionally obstruct lifesaving aid deliveries during a man-made famine in the northern part of the Gaza Strip.
(UN News)* — The situation in the gang-ravaged capital of Haiti has gone from worrying to “extremely alarming” as conditions in Port-au-Prince continue to worsen amid growing hunger and serious shortages in hospitals to treat gunshot victims, said the UN Humanitarian Coordinator there on Thursday [].
“It’s important we don’t let the violence spill over from the capital into the country,” said Ulrika Richardson, briefing journalists at UN Headquarters via videolink from Haiti.
Credit: UN Photo/Loey Felipe
– Speaking at the third Summit for Democracy in South Korea last week, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken warned that a malicious “flood” of disinformation is threatening the world’s democracies—triggered in part by the rise of artificial intelligence (AI). Continue reading
HUMAN WRONGS WATCH 