Archive for ‘Africa’

24/05/2021

“Vesak”, the Day of the Full Moon in May, Is the Most Sacred Day to Millions of Buddhists around the World

Lumbini, the birthplace of Buddha.

Siddhartha Gautama, the Lord Buddha, was born in 623 B.C. in the famous gardens of Lumbini, which soon became a place of pilgrimage. PHOTO:UN/Pengfei Mi
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24 May 2021 (United Nations)* — “Vesak”, the Day of the Full Moon in the month of May, is the most sacred day to millions of Buddhists around the world. It was on the Day of Vesak two and a half millennia ago, in the year 623 B.C., that the Buddha was born.
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It was also on the Day of Vesak that the Buddha attained enlightenment, and it was on the Day of Vesak that the Buddha in his eightieth year passed away.
23/05/2021

Arctic Assessment Report Shows Faster Rate of Warming

23/05/2021

Seed Biodiversity: The Life Insurance of Our Food Production

Human Wrongs Watch

22 May 2021 (FAO)* — Humans rely on a shockingly low number of plants for the majority of our daily calories. In fact, of the thousands of fruit and vegetable species cultivated for food, fewer than 200 make up a substantial part of food produced globally.


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Thousands of plant species and varieties that fed our ancestors are already extinct, and we are losing more every day. Diversity is our food’s life insurance. ©FAO/Luis Tato

But what if climate change, invasive species, pollution, city sprawl or overuse of land cause these species to weaken, lowering their ability to produce or survive into the future?

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23/05/2021

‘Humanity Is “Waging a War on Nature”, Threatening Biodiversity Loss, Climate Disruption and Escalating Pollution…’

Human Wrongs Watch

Everyone will lose unless humanity makes ‘peace with the planet’ – UN Chief.

UN News/Elizabeth Scaffidi | The sun sets in Acadia National Park, Maine, United States.

(UN News)* — Humanity is “waging a war on nature”, threatening biodiversity loss, climate disruption and escalating pollution, the UN chief on 21 May 2021 said.

“We will all be losers if we don’t achieve peace with the planet”, Secretary-General António Guterres told a webinar ahead of the International Day for Biological Diversity, commemorated annually on 22 May. “We should all be advocates for nature”, he said.

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23/05/2021

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22 May 2021 (United Nations)* — As the global community is called to re-examine our relationship to the natural world, one thing is certain: despite all our technological advances we are completely dependent on healthy and vibrant ecosystems for our water, food, medicines, clothes, fuel, shelter and energy, just to name a few.
23/05/2021

How to Address the Emergence and Spread of Zoonotic Diseases

Human Wrongs Watch

New international expert panel to address the emergence and spread of zoonotic diseases

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Geneva/Paris/Rome/Nairobi, 20 May 2021 (UNEP)* – International organizations have come together to launch a new One Health High-Level Expert Panel to improve understanding of how diseases with the potential to trigger pandemics, emerge and spread.

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23/05/2021

Bees, Bans and Broad-Spectrum Pesticides

(UNEP)*Bees and other pollinators are increasingly under threat from human activities. To raise awareness of the importance of pollinators and their contribution to sustainable development, the UN marks May 20 as World Bee Day.

black and brown bee lot

This year, the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) examines how a decades-old legacy of DDT use has imperilled Tajikistan’s bees and the actions being taken to reverse this trend.

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20/05/2021

Large Corporations Cash in on COVID-19 Relief Funds

Human Wrongs Watch

BRATISLAVA , May 18 2021 (IPS)* – Poverty and income inequality are being deepened as COVID-19 relief funds are handed out to large corporations instead of social protection programmes in developing countries, groups involved in a new study of COVID-19 bailouts have said.

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20/05/2021

Fresh Attacks, Dire Conditions Plague Africa’s Sahel

Human Wrongs Watch

(UN News)* — Despite a deteriorating security situation and the reverberating effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, regional troops deployed to combat terrorists in Africa’s Sahel region have scaled up the tempo of their operations in recent months, efforts that must be matched by a spirit of solidarity among their global partners, the senior UN peacekeeping official on 18 May 2021 told the Security Council.

MINUSMA/Harandane Dicko | MINUSMA peacekeepers on patrol in Niafounké in Mali.
Jean-Pierre Lacroix, Under-Secretary-General for Peace Operations, told delegates that the fight against armed groups in the Sahel has intensified since late 2020.
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He described the Joint Force first deployed in 2017 by the “Group of Five” (G-5) Sahel countries – Burkina Faso, Chad, Mali, Mauritania and Niger – as a vital part of the security response in the region.
20/05/2021

Sexual Violence Survivors in DR Congo Caught in Crisis of ‘Catastrophic Magnitude’

19 May 2021 (UN News)*On a recent visit to the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Dr. Natalie Kanem, the head of the UN Population Fund (UNFPA), the UN’s sexual and reproductive health agency, bore witness to the horrific legacy of sexual violence in the country, which is undergoing one of the world’s longest-running humanitarian crises.
 
UNFPA/Luis Tato | UNFPA Executive Director Dr. Natalia Kanem visits a hospital in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

‘The men broke my body and shattered my soul’

 “We waited for hours in the distribution point until they eventually told us to go home. Hungry and empty-handed, I walked with three other women and two little girls. It was dusk, and I heard the little girls scream.

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