18 March 2014 – With about half of the health facilities in strife-torn Central African Republic (CAR) having been looted, the United Nations today appealed for immediate additional resources to scale up efforts to meet the country’s significant health needs. Prior the crisis that began over a year ago, Car had some of the worst global health indicators, according to the World Health Organization (WHO). For example, the country had the sixth-highest child mortality and the third-highest maternal mortality rates in the world. The already weak health system has now virtually collapsed. During the conflict, health facilities have been looted…
Author: UN News
18 March 2014 – The United Nations peacekeeping chief today called on the parties in South sudan to respect the cessation of hostilities agreement they signed two months ago, amid reports of fighting between Government and opposition forces on the ground. “The security and humanitarian situation in South sudan will continue to deteriorate until the parties fully engage in the political talks, respect the cessation of hostilities and allow freedom of movement for the United Nations and its partners,” Under-Secretary-General for Peacekeeping Operations Hervé Ladsous said as he briefed the Security Council. “Both parties continue to prioritize the pursuit of…
18 March 2014 – Massive international support is crucial as the number of Syrian refugees in Lebanon continues to rise and is on track to reaching 1.5 million by the end of this year, a senior United Nations humanitarian official stressed today. “It is imperative that the international community helps bear the brunt of the pressure on Lebanon,” Ross Mountain, the Acting UN Resident and Humanitarian Coordinator in Lebanon, told a news conference in Geneva. As the conflict in Syria enters its fourth year, there are nearly 2.5 million Syrians registered as refugees in Lebanon, Turkey, Jordan, Iraq and Egypt,…
18 March 2014 – As the Syrian war enters a fourth year, the harrowing violence shows no signs of subsiding – the fighting has driven some nine million civilians from their homes and has reduced many of those who remain to scavenging – said the head of a United Nations-appointed human rights panel, denouncing the international community’s inaction in the pursuit of peace and accountability. The Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Syrian Arab Republic – appointed by the UN Human Rights Council – presented earlier today in Geneva a detailed report on the living conditions of men and…
18 March 2014 – Hundreds of thousands of Syrians forced to flee the bloodshed in their homeland and now living in Jordan, are struggling to make lives for themselves outside that country’s protective umbrella of refugee camps, a study co-led by the United Nations refugees agency found. “The survey shows the day-to-day survival struggle of some 450,000 registered Syrian refugees as they face rising rents, inadequate housing and educational challenges for their children,” despite the support Jordan offers to them, including free access to the public health care and school systems, said Dan McNorton, spokesperson for the Office of the…
18 March 2014 – Against the backdrop of last week’s ‘dangerous escalation’ in Gaza and Israel, the top United Nations political official told the Security Council today that this latest upsurge serves as yet another reminder that the international community must work together to resolve the Arab-Israeli conflict and restore prospects for a durable peace throughout the Middle East. “Last week, with the situation in Gaza, we came very close to the brink of another crisis in an already volatile region,” Under-Secretary-General for Political Affairs Jeffrey Feltman said, referring to the most recent actions by both sides undermining the fragile…
17 March 2014 – As Jordan struggles with severe water shortage issues – ongoing drought, population growth and now waves of refugees fleeing the Syrian conflict – the country is at a critical moment, said a United Nations independent expert today, emphasizing its need to take a holistic, long-term approach to its water and sanitation strategies. “The existing emergency measures to the water scarcity problem are not sufficient or sustainable,” said UN Special Rapporteur on the human right to safe drinking water and sanitation, Catarina de Albuquerque, wrapping a six-day visit to Jordan. “There must be a link between current…
17 March 2014 – The United Nations Mission in South sudan (UNMISS) says it is in the process of relocating civilians displaced amid the recent conflict to better shelter ahead of coming rains. Some 706,000 people have been displaced since fighting between pro- and anti-Government forces began in mid-December 2013, 77,000 of whom are seeking refuge at UNMISS bases. The Mission will be providing protection by escorting buses, transporting internally displaced people between its Tomping Compound in the capital, Juba, and the UN House. “The Mission says that the congestion of sites, compounded by the coming rains, remains a major…
14 March 2014 – The head of the United Nations peacekeeping mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (MONUSCO) today urged the international community as well as the Congolese Government to adopt concrete measures that will build on the current stability in the country, saying “it is now up to us to win the peace…with energy, conviction and persistence.” “There is a new momentum and we have to build on it. Our robust protection stance and the hard-won stability are the foundation to build peace,” Special Representative Martin Kobler said, in a briefing to the Security Council, in which…
14 March 2014 – The United Nations refugee agency (UNHCR) and its partners said today that they are stepping up efforts to help the growing numbers of Central African refugees arriving ill in Cameroon due to hunger and exhaustion during their arduous flight from the war-torn country. According to UNHCR, most of the new arrivals from the Central African Republic (CAR) have spent weeks hiding in the bush without access to sufficient water and food and have walked great distances to reach safety in the eastern Cameroon. Most are fleeing anti-Balaka militiamen who have reportedly targeted Muslims in revenge attacks.…
14 March 2014 – Wrapping a historic visit to Nigeria, the United Nations rights chief today congratulated the Government for its efforts towards tackling “very difficult human rights problems”, but stressed the need to urgently resolve the conflict in the country’s northeast, end corruption, and protect its vulnerable populations, including the LGBT community, which ‘lives in fear”. “Since Nigeria’s transition to democracy, much has been achieved on the human rights front,’ noted Navi Pillay, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, at a press conference during her four-day visit to assess the situation in the country. “At the same time,” she…
14 March 2014 – Local masons in Timbuktu today started to lay down the first earthen bricks to reconstruct World Heritage mausoleums damaged when radical Islamists occupied the northern part of the country in 2012. “The rehabilitation of the cultural heritage of Timbuktu is crucial for the people of Mali, for the city’s residents and for the world,” said Irina Bokova, Director-General of the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), marking today’s ceremony. “The very name Timbuktu sparks the imagination of millions of people in all parts of the planet,” she added. Timbuktu was an economic, intellectual and spiritual…
15 March 2014 – With nearly 13 million Syrians uprooted from their homes, senior United Nations officials warn that without a political solution to the conflict, which today enters its fourth year, Syria and its people face years more of destruction and continued brutality. “Children, women and men are being used as pawns by parties to the conflict in their battle for territorial advantage,” said the Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs, Valerie Amos. An entire generation of children has been traumatized and brutalized. Hospitals and school playgrounds have been attacked, and residential neighbourhoods are flattened by barrel bombs, she noted. “Our…
14 March 2014 – Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon today appealed yet again for the international community to help bring the rival Syrian parties closer on concrete measures to end the conflict, saying “it is not enough for representatives of the Government and opposition to be in the same room, what matters most is what they do there.”“The political process is in crisis,” Mr. Ban told reporters after the closed door session with the UN General Assembly. “After two rounds of talks [in Geneva], neither side is displaying any will to compromise or any true awareness of the I strongly urge the…
14 March 2014 – The Security Council today extended for another year the United Nations mission assisting Libya, as preparations in the North African country turn to upcoming parliamentary elections due to be held in June. In the resolution adopted today, the 15-member Council wrote that as an immediate priority, the UN Support Mission in Libya (UNSMIL) would ensure the success of the democratic transition process in the country, which has been under way since the toppling of Muammar al-Qadhafi three years ago. This includes promoting, facilitating and providing technical advice, as well as assisting a single, inclusive and transparent…
15 March 2014 – Owing to the negative vote of one of its permanent members, the United Nations Security Council today failed to adopt a draft resolution which urged countries not to recognize the results of this weekend’s referendum in Crimea. Thirteen of the Council’s 15 members voted in favour of the draft text, russia voted against, and China abstained. A veto by any of the Council’s five permanent members – China, France, Russia, the United Kingdom and the United States – means a resolution cannot be adopted. The resolution would have reaffirmed Ukraine’s “sovereignty, independence, unity and territorial integrity”…
14 March 2014 – United Nations Assistant Secretary-General for Human Rights, Ivan Šimonovic, announced today the immediate deployment of a UN monitoring team throughout crisis-torn Ukraine to help establish the facts surrounding alleged human rights violations, including in Crimea, and serve to de-escalate tensions in the country. Speaking via video conference from Kiev, Mr. Šimonovic told reporters in New York that during his short visit to Ukraine, he had identified chronic human rights violations; some dating from the Soviet era, and others, such as excessive use of force and arbitrary detentioI am gravely concerned about the situation in Crimea, where…
13 March 2014 – The United Nations continued efforts on multiple fronts to de-escalate tensions in Ukraine, with a senior human rights official holding meetings today in the capital, Kiev, while in New York, the Security Council held its sixth urgent session on the crisis, hearing the UN political chief stress that the path to a peaceful resolution is still open – “let us seize it.” The Permanent Mission of Ukraine to the UN requested the Council to convene urgently “due to the deterioration of the situation in the Autonomous Republic of the Crimea, Ukraine, which threatens the territorial integrity…
14 March 2014 – Deeply concerned about violent confrontations between the police and members of opposition in Burundi, Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon is urging both the government and political parties to de-escalate tensions and to campaign against political violence ahead of the presidential and parliamentary elections in 2015. In a statement released yesterday evening by his spokesperson, Mr. Ban deplored the “growing restrictions on the freedom of expression, association and assembly, especially the prohibition and disruption of opposition meetings by the police and the youth wing of the ruling party”. Respecting these freedoms and other human rights is a precondition for…
13 March 2014 – United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said he was “honoured” to meet at Headquarters with three religious leaders from the Central African Republic (CAR), whom he described as a “powerful symbol of their country’s longstanding tradition of peaceful coexistence.” The UN chief thanked the religious leaders – Mgr. Dieudonne Nzapalainga, Roman Catholic Archbishop of Bangui, Imam Oumar Kobine Layama, President of the Islamic Council in the Central African Republic, and Reverend Nicolas Guérékoyame-Gbangou, President of the CAR’s Evangelical Alliance – and warned that their legacy of peaceful coexistence stands “under threat.” The country has been war-torn since…