'Unseen' News and Views – By Baher Kamal & The Like
Geneva, 30 January 2018 – IOM, the UN Migration Agency, reports that 5,502 migrants and refugees entered Europe by sea through 28 January. This compares with 5,288 coming ashore during a similar period in 2017. Italy accounts for approximately 58 per cent of the total, with the remainder split between Spain (22 per cent) and Greece (20 per cent).*
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IOM
IOM Rome reported on Monday (29 January) that 965 migrants have been rescued at sea during the weekend by Italian and international rescue ships, with some still being brought to land late Monday (and so not included in the table below).
Juba, 30 January 2018 (IOM)* – After more than four years of armed conflict – and despite efforts to revive the peace process – humanitarian needs in South Sudan remain immense, as conditions continue to deteriorate.
Wau protection of civilians site. Photo: Peter Bauza 2017 | IOM
To address these growing needs, IOM South Sudan is appealing for USD 103.7 million in 2018 to provide lifesaving humanitarian assistance, as well as to support transition, recovery and migration management initiatives.
Today, an estimated 7 million people in South Sudan need relief aid, including 1.9 million internally displaced persons (IDPs).
30 January, 2018 (Greenpeace)* — If it seems like we’ve been talking about lawsuits a lot lately, it’s because we have. Corporate bullies, helped by Donald Trump’s go-to law firm, have filed two massive lawsuits against Greenpeace in the last two years. They aim to silence us, but we are not alone.
Participants and activists appear outside a United States District Court – October, 2017
Many of our allies and other individual activists are fighting meritless lawsuits of their own.
**Image: A 16th-century illustration by Flemish Protestant Theodor de Bry for Las Casas’s Brevisima relación de la destrucción de las Indias, depicting Spanish atrocities during the conquest of Cuba.| This work is in the public domain in its country of origin and other countries and areas where the copyright term is the author’s life plus 100 years or less. | Wikimedia Commons: “This file has been identified as being free of known restrictions under copyright law, including all related and neighboring rights.“
30 January 2018 – Facing an acute funding shortage, the United Nations agency for Palestine refugees is seeking more than 800 million dollars for its emergency programmes for Syria and the Occupied Palestinian Territory.
From 21-24 February 2016, UNRWA distributed 19,160 thermal blankets to approximately 5,700 Palestinian refugee and other civilian families from the besieged and hard to reach Syrian communities of Yarmouk, Yalda, Babila and Beit Saham. Photo: UNRWA
The appeal would enable the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) to “continue delivering desperately needed relief to those affected by deepening emergency situations,” UNRWA Commissioner-General Pierre Krähenbühl said at a launch event in Geneva.
