'Unseen' News and Views
(UN NEWS)* — Senior UN officials and donor partners on Sunday [] visited the Palestinian refugee camp in the West Bank city of Jenin, where they witnessed the “shocking” damage sustained during the Israeli incursion this past week.
Europe was the epicenter of World Wars I and II, and now it threatens, with its war in the Ukraine, to kindle World War III.
As usual in history, overt warfare is the fruit of a constant, underlying culture of war. And in the case of Europe, it was the culture of war developed over many centuries to maintain the profits of colonialism.
Dr. David Adams
To understand this, let us first turn to that old critic, Vladimir Lenin.
In his essay War and Revolution of May, 1917, Lenin wrote, “Peace reigned in Europe, but this was because domination over hundreds of millions of people in the colonies by the European nations was sustained only through constant, incessant, interminable wars, which we Europeans do not regard as wars at all, since all too often they resembled, not wars, but brutal massacres, the wholesale slaughter of unarmed peoples.”
Tunis – Tunisian security forces have collectively expelled several hundred Black African migrants and asylum seekers, including children and pregnant women, since July 2, 2023 to a remote, militarized buffer zone at the Tunisia–Libya border, Human Rights Watch on 6 July 2023 said.
(UN News)* — The UN Office on Genocide Prevention and the Responsibility to Protect launched a new policy paper on Wednesday [] aimed at countering and addressing hate speech online.
The policy paper, Countering and Addressing Online Hate Speech: A Guide for Policy Makers and Practitioners, was developed jointly by the UN Office with the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) Human Rights, Big Data and Technology Project, at the UK’s University of Essex.
Presenting her latest annual report, Virginia Gamba, the Secretary-General’s Special Representative for Children and Armed Conflict, appealed for “bold and resolute action” to protect boys and girls at risk of death, recruitment, rape and other horrors.
Anti-racism protesters in Brooklyn, New York, demonstrate demanding justice for the killing of African American, George Floyd. Credit: UN News/Shirin Yaseen
During the three years since a white police officer brutally murdered Floyd, nationwide discussions of systemic racism have extended well beyond focusing on law enforcement to also assess a range of other government functions.
But such scrutiny comes to a halt at the water’s edge — stopping short of probing whether racism has been a factor in U.S. military interventions overseas.
(UN NEWS)* — The [United Nations] Secretary-General condemned on Wednesday [] Israel’s recent advancement of plans for over 5,500 housing units in settlements in the occupied West Bank. He also denounced the retroactive regularization of three outposts adjacent to the settlement of Eli.
A strongly worded statement by the Spokesperson for the Secretary-General reiterates that settlements are a flagrant violation of international law and relevant UN resolutions. Antonio Guterres, it says, urged the Government of Israel to halt and reverse the expansion of settlements in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, to immediately and completely cease all settlements activities there and to respect its relevant legal obligations.
The statement refers to the Monday’s advancement of plans for over 5,500 housing units in Israeli settlements in Area C of the occupied West Bank, including the retroactive regularization, under Israeli law, of three settlement outposts adjacent to the settlement of Eli.
In the United States and Canada, overdose deaths, predominantly driven by an epidemic of the non-medical use of fentanyl, continue to break records. Credit: Shutterstock.
In the specific case of Asia, a specialised organisation reports the Asian ‘Golden Triangle’ is where historically opium was grown to produce heroin for export, but where, in recent years, the trade of “even deadlier and more profitable synthetic drugs have taken over.”
(UN NEWS)* — An independent UN-appointed climate expert on Tuesday [] called for full legal protection to be given to those displaced by the impacts of climate change, to guarantee their human rights.
“In 2020 alone, 30.7 million people were displaced from their homes due to weather-related events. Droughts were the main factor,” Mr. Fry said in his latest thematic report to the Human Rights Council in Geneva. “We must take immediate steps to give legal protection to these people.”
(UN NEWS)* — Violations of international law regarding children and armed conflict continued to have a “devastating impact”, the UN’s top official on the issue said on Tuesday [], with a 112 per cent rise in the number of attacks on schools and hospitals.
Special Representative for Children and Armed Conflict Virginia Gamba unveiled the Secretary-General’s latest annual report, for 2022, which showed there were 27,180 grave violations overall, an increase from the previous year.
The recorded violations only refer to verified information, with the likely toll much higher, and cover four categories: recruitment and use of children into armed groups or forces, killing and maiming, rape and sexual violence, and abduction.
HUMAN WRONGS WATCH 