Approximately 4.3 million people, over half of them children, have been affected by a multifaceted crisis characterized by conflict, climate-induced disasters, hunger and epidemics. A military coup in July 2023 and the ensuing political instability has further exacerbated their plight. Edem Wosornu, Operations Director at the UN Office for Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA),…
Sean Casey, WHO Health Emergency Officer, was speaking fresh from a more than five-week visit to the war-torn enclave, where he said convoys have faced access and security constraints, as well as movement limitations. “The last week that I was in Gaza, we tried every single day for seven days to deliver fuel and supplies…
Speaking at the annual World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, the UN chief condemned the “barbaric” Hamas-led attacks on 7 October in which approximately 1,200 people were butchered in southern Israel and some 250 taken as hostages. And amid reports of ongoing heavy Israeli bombardment which has left tens of thousands of civilians dead and…
Sigrid Kaag was appointed to monitor and verify aid shipments into Gaza, in line with a UN Security Council resolution adopted last month. She will also work to establish a mechanism for accelerating aid flows into Gaza through States that are not party to the conflict. Acute needs Ms. Kaag said she was in Egypt…
A staggering six million people have been displaced within Sudan since the war between rival militaries – the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RAF) – erupted on 15 April 2023. A further 1.7 million civilians have sought refuge across borders in South Sudan, Chad, Ethiopia, Egypt, the Central African…
Incumbent President of the island archipelago off the east African coast, Azali Assoumani, was re-elected for a fourth term. However, the turnout was reportedly only 16 per cent and opposition parties denounced the elections as “fraudulent”, according to media reports. In a statement released by his office (OHCHR) on Wednesday, Volker Türk called on…
Trends in 2022 showed that roughly one in five adults worldwide uses tobacco, compared to one in three in the year 2000. While cigarette smoking is the most common form of tobacco use worldwide, other products include cigars, waterpipe tobacco also known as hookah, and smokeless tobacco products, all of which are harmful. The “tobacco…
“In the first two weeks of January, only 24 per cent – seven out of 29 – of planned missions to deliver food, medicine, water and other lifesaving supplies successfully reached their destinations north of Wadi Gaza,” said the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA). Echoing those concerns and highlighting the dire situation…
Hundreds of people across the country were killed or wounded in drone and missile strikes in the 10-day period between 29 December and 8 January alone. “Civilian casualties had been steadily decreasing in 2023 but the wave of attacks in late December and early January violently interrupted that trend,” said Danielle Bell, head of the…
Eastern and southern African nations are among the worst affected, accounting for about 75 per cent of the fatalities and a third of the cases, as of 15 January, according to UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF). With the regions also suffering from lack of adequate clean water and sanitation, and poor case management, children are particularly…
