The situation represents one of the world’s worst food crises, according to the UN-partnered Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) platform. “The humanitarian situation in the DRC is deteriorating at an alarming rate. Families who were already struggling to feed themselves are now facing an even harsher reality,” said Eric Perdison,...
The UN’s top aid official, Tom Fletcher, said that more than 300 million people urgently need assistance. But funding has been falling annually, and this year’s levels are projected to drop to a record low. “Brutal funding cuts don’t mean that humanitarian needs disappear; today’s emergency fund allocation channels resources...
Dead bodies lie in the streets, hospitals are overwhelmed and there has been an uptick in reports of sexual violence, rape and looting. “Roads are blocked, ports are closed and those crossing Lake Kivu risk their lives in makeshift boats,” said Shelley Thakral, spokesperson for the UN World Food Programme...
Intensifying hostilities in eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo involving the non-state armed group M23 have caused further mass displacement in the mineral-rich region, with fears that the regional capital Goma could come under attack, UN agencies warned on Friday....
“We are deeply alarmed at the heightened risk of an attack by the M23 armed group on Goma, the capital of North Kivu, in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo…Any such attack on Goma risks catastrophic impacts on hundreds of thousands of civilians, putting them at heightened exposure to human...
Co-facilitated by the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) and the World Meteorological Organization (WMO), this global initiative seeks to unite efforts worldwide to protect these vital water sources, which provide freshwater to more than 2 billion people. Glaciers and ice sheets hold around 70 per cent of the...
icardo Pires, UNICEF Communication Manager for Emergencies, told journalists from Damascus that in the last nine years, at least 422,000 incidents involving unexploded ordnance – or UXO – were reported in 14 governorates across Syria, “with half estimated to have ended in tragic child casualties”. “Girls and boys in the...
The UN Security Council met on Friday morning in New York to debate the collapse of health services in Gaza. The meeting was called by Algeria, the leading voice for the Arab world on the Council which has just taken the gavel as president for the month of January. Senior...
At the end of December, a joint UN convoy of nine trucks successfully reached people in Beit Hanoun, northern Gaza, who had been cut off from aid for over 75 days. Images taken by UN staffers showed desperate residents rushing out from shelters to retrieve the bottled water, flour and...
The Alinity m MPXV assay is a real-time PCR (polymerase chain reaction) test that enables detection of monkeypox virus DNA from human skin lesion swabs. It is manufactured by Abbott Molecular Inc, an American company, and specifically designed for use by trained clinical laboratory personnel. ‘A significant milestone’ “This first...
The Security Council met in emergency session on Friday following Israeli strikes on the Lebanese capital Beirut and in the south, which have left at least a dozen dead. It comes amid an uptick in cross-border fire between Hezbollah and Israeli forces – and two days of deadly wireless device...
Ambassadors in the UN General Assembly again discussed on Monday the dire humanitarian situation in Gaza and the critical work of the UN agency for Palestine refugees, UNRWA, which is facing an existential threat, hearing a briefing by its Commissioner-General, Philippe Lazzarini, and holding a heated debate on the US...