Keep global spotlight on Haiti as millions go hungry, WFP official says

Keep global spotlight on Haiti as millions go hungry, WFP official says

“We now have five million people in Haiti that are acutely food insecure, of which 1.6 million are classified as facing emergency food insecurity conditions,” said WFP Country Director Jean-Martin Bauer, speaking via videolink to journalists at UN Headquarters in New York. “These are the highest numbers on record. These are the highest numbers we’ve…

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Tackling health impacts of climate change and scaling up digital climate action in the spotlight at COP28

Tackling health impacts of climate change and scaling up digital climate action in the spotlight at COP28

Ahead of the first ever ‘Health Day’ at a UN climate conference, delegates signed onto a new declaration on climate and health and separately considered the role of digital technology can play in climate action.  The UN World Health Organization (WHO) welcomed the new declaration, which aims to help accelerate actions to protect people from…

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Iran: Executions and detentions in spotlight at Human Rights Council

Iran: Executions and detentions in spotlight at Human Rights Council

“We have expressed concerns” over the investigation into her death, said Viviana Krsticevic, a member of the Fact-Finding Mission on Iran, speaking at a press conference in Geneva: “in particular over the fact that today her family’s right to truth and justice remains unfulfilled”.  She added that the investigations had “fallen short of international human…

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Health data, women’s and LGBT rights in spotlight at Human Rights Council

Health data, women’s and LGBT rights in spotlight at Human Rights Council

The Special Rapporteur on the right to health, Tlaleng Mofokeng, warned that technology enabled easy sharing of sensitive health data of adolescents, migrants and people whose sexual orientation or health status was subject to discrimination. “Accessibility of information through digital tools should not impair the right to have personal health data treated with confidentiality,” Ms. Mofokeng…

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Sudan violations in spotlight at UN Human Rights Council

Sudan violations in spotlight at UN Human Rights Council

The development comes after more than three weeks of fighting between the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) loyal to General Abdel Fattah Al Burhan and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) led by Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo. UN rights chief Volker Türk opened the meeting condemning the “wanton violence” which has brought more hunger, deprivation and displacement upon the Sudanese people, while…

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UN independent experts spotlight ‘prima facie war crime’ in East Jerusalem

UN independent experts spotlight ‘prima facie war crime’ in East Jerusalem

“There has been an ongoing and unchecked tragedy: the forced eviction of Palestinians from their homes,” they said in a joint statement.  “Israel’s transfer of its own population into the occupied territory confirms a deliberate intention to colonize the territory it occupies, a practice strictly prohibited by international humanitarian law,” they said. “It amounts to…

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Haiti crisis in spotlight, as top human rights body wraps marathon session

Haiti crisis in spotlight, as top human rights body wraps marathon session

An independent expert mandate on Haiti had been created by the Council in 1995 but then discontinued in 2017. The current resolution, calling for “coordinated and targeted international action”, was sponsored by Haiti itself. Country-specific abuses As a subsidiary body of the UN General Assembly, the Council examines human rights violations in specific countries as…

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Myanmar: Tatmadaw army’s ‘scorched earth’ policy in spotlight

Myanmar: Tatmadaw army’s ‘scorched earth’ policy in spotlight

“Continuous” violence, including the killing, arbitrary arrest, torture and enforced disappearance of opponents in Myanmar between 1 February 2022 and 31 January 2023, have left the country’s people desperate for outside help, OHCHR’s James Rodehaver said, unveiling the Office’s latest report on the crisis. “Despite all the challenges that they face, so far there has…

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