UN chief calls for all hands on deck at Climate Promise 2025 launch

UN chief calls for all hands on deck at Climate Promise 2025 launch

The Climate Promise 2025 aims to accelerate efforts from local to international levels to take more ambitious steps to ensure the global temperature does not heat up beyond the 1.5° limit, a goal set with the 2015 Paris Agreement on climate change. UN Secretary-General António Guterres said the initiative, driven by the UN Development Programme (UNDP),…

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UNRWA committed to implement independent review recommendations

UNRWA committed to implement independent review recommendations

Commissioner-General Philippe Lazzarini briefed journalists in New York a day after the independent review panel published its findings.  Former French Foreign Minister Catherine Colonna spearheaded the report, which found that UNRWA has put in place a large number of mechanisms and procedures to ensure its commitment to the principle of neutrality and outlines some 50…

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Silence the guns, amplify women’s voices for peace to end rape in wartime

Silence the guns, amplify women’s voices for peace to end rape in wartime

Presenting her annual report, Pramila Patten, the Secretary-General’s Special Representative on Sexual Violence in Conflict, noted that weapons continue to flow into the hands of perpetrators while most victims remain emptyhanded when it comes to reparations and redress.  “The essential, existential task we face is to silence the guns and amplify the voices of women…

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General Assembly debates Security Council’s rising veto use

General Assembly debates Security Council’s rising veto use

Assembly President Dennis Francis emphasised that the Security Council remains unable to collectively address critical peace and security situations in the Gaza Strip, Mali, Syria and Ukraine as well as concerning the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK). “At this precarious time of heightened geopolitical tensions and when ongoing and emerging crises demand our urgent and…

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UNRWA report: UN chief stands with agency, backs findings of probe into 7 October attacks in Israel

UNRWA report: UN chief stands with agency, backs findings of probe into 7 October attacks in Israel

The Final Report, led by former French foreign minister Catherine Colonna, was due to be released later on Monday; Ms. Colonna was also preparing to speak to journalists at a scheduled noon briefing in New York as Chair of the Independent Review Group on UNRWA.  “The Secretary-General accepts the recommendations contained in Ms. Colonna’s report,” Mr….

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Thousands of children killed or maimed by explosive weapons in populated areas: UNICEF

Thousands of children killed or maimed by explosive weapons in populated areas: UNICEF

UNICEF warned that as urban warfare increases, the use of weapons designed for open battlefields are now a common reality in cities, towns and villages, with devastating effects on their young residents.  Between 2018 and 2022, explosive weapons were responsible for 49.8 per cent of the more than 47,500 instances of children killed and maimed…

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