Category Archives: United Nations

Human rights in decline globally as leaders fail to uphold laws, report warns

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Human Rights Watch’s annual report highlights politicians’ double standards and ‘transactional diplomacy’ amid escalating crises

Human rights across the world are in a parlous state as leaders shun their obligations to uphold international law, according to the annual report of Human Rights Watch (HRW).

In its 2024 world report, HRW warns grimly of escalating human rights crises around the globe, with wartime atrocities increasing, suppression of human rights defenders on the rise, and universal human rights principles and laws being attacked and undermined by governments.

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Most want to flee ‘pressure cooker’ of southern Gaza, UN refugee deputy says

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Deputy leader of UN agency for Palestinian refugees says situation in territory is ‘full-time emergency’

Southern Gaza is turning into a “pressure cooker”, where the majority of people – faced with dwindling food, inadequate water sanitation, overcrowding and a crumbling hospital service – want to flee, the deputy director of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees has said.

Scott Anderson of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), who is engaged in daily negotiations to gain Israeli permissions for aid convoys to enter and move around Gaza, said it was in “a full-time emergency” and just six of the 21 planned convoys to the north of the territory had been granted access since January despite a UN security council resolution in December calling for relief to be stepped up.

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Red Sea crisis: UN security council demands immediate end to Houthi attacks

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Resolution calling for cessation of attacks on shipping vessels by Yemen’s Houthis adopted despite abstentions from Russia and China

The UN security council has called for an immediate end to attacks by Yemen’s Houthi rebels on shipping in the Red Sea, adopting a resolution despite abstentions from Russia and China.

The resolution also called on the Houthis to release the Galaxy Leader, a Japanese-operated vehicle carrier linked to an Israeli businessman that the group commandeered on 19 November, along with its 25 crew.

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Somalian rebels kill one and abduct five after UN helicopter’s emergency landing

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Al-Shabaab fighters attack after aircraft carrying medical professionals and soldiers lands in their territory

Al-Shabaab fighters in Somalia have attacked a United Nations helicopter that made an emergency landing in rebel-held territory, killing one passenger and abducting five others.

The minister of internal security of Galmudug state in central Somalia, Mohamed Abdi Aden Gaboobe, said the helicopter made the landing in Xindheere village on Wednesday after engine failure.

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UN warns Gaza is now ‘uninhabitable’ as war continues

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Humanitarian chief fears ‘famine is around the corner’ with 85% of population displaced and more than 20,000 dead

The UN humanitarian chief has described Gaza as “uninhabitable” three months into Israel’s war with Hamas, warning that famine was looming and a public health disaster unfolding.

In a grim assessment of the devastating impact of Israel’s military response to the horrific Hamas attacks on 7 October, Martin Griffiths said that Gaza’s 2.3 million people face “daily threats to their very existence” while the world just watches.

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Global economy faces period of prolonged weakness, UN warns

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Secretary general urges countries to increase investment to avoid falling behind on climate action and sustainable development

The world faces a protracted period of weak economic growth that will undermine progress on sustainable development, the UN has warned, as it urged countries to raise investment to tackle the climate emergency.

Its annual assessment of the state of the global economy presents a sombre outlook for growth as countries grapple with the impact of higher borrowing costs, geopolitical tensions and heightened risk of climate disasters.

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Mossad chief says Israel is committed to finding and killing all Hamas leaders

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Comments by David Barnea follow assassination of Hamas deputy political chief Saleh al-Arouri in Lebanon

The head of Israel’s foreign intelligence service has vowed to track down and kill all Hamas leaders responsible for attacking Israel, less than a day after a drone strike in Lebanon killed the militant organisation’s second most senior official.

David Barnea said on Wednesday the Mossad was “committed to settling the score with the murderers who descended upon the Gaza envelope” on 7 October and with those who planned the attacks.

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Why Labour needs to decide whether to break the consensus on Israel

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Airstrikes against Houthi rebels and the prospect of a year-long Gaza conflict will test cross-party thinking at Westminster

Two developments in the past 48 hours could test the cross-party consensus in Westminster on the conflict between Israel and Hamas: the signal sent by the Ministry of Defence that it is prepared to join the US in launching airstrikes against Houthi sites in Yemen, and statements by the Israeli political and military leadership that the war may take months or even a whole year to complete.

Labour has so far largely concurred with UK government policy, which in turn has largely shadowed thinking inside the White House.

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Howard government worked with Canada to oppose UN declaration on Indigenous rights

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Cabinet papers from 2003 show the government pursued talks without consulting peak Indigenous body – which it then abolished

The Howard government fought strongly against recognising the right of Indigenous peoples to “self-determination” and worked secretly with Canada to try to change a draft UN declaration, newly released cabinet papers show.

The cabinet papers from 2003, released by the National Archives on Monday, show that some Australian government departments held concerns about potential impacts of the UN declaration on the rights of Indigenous peoples, but Australia’s talks with Canada on amendments were being pursued with “no Indigenous consultation about the process or its product” as such input would be “premature”.

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Middle East is sliding closer to the edge of a wider regional conflict | Julian Borger

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An escalation could spark a conflagration that would bring Israel into open confrontation with Iran, and suck in the US too

The Middle East has been slipping towards the precipice of a regional war ever since the Hamas attack on Israel on 7 October and the ferocious Israeli response in Gaza. The past week has shown how the cliff edge keeping it from that abyss could quickly crumble away.

Within hours of the outbreak of the Gaza war, the Hezbollah Shia militia in Lebanon began to fire on northern Israeli towns and villages in solidarity with Palestinians, triggering Israeli air strikes in response, and Houthi forces in Yemen attacked ships in the Red Sea with real or perceived Israeli connections.

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Why are ties between Russia and Israel ‘at lowest point since fall of the Soviet Union’?

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Russia’s pro-Palestinian stance has inflamed tensions and underscored shift in relations since invasion of Ukraine

When Vladimir Putin spoke by telephone this month to Benjamin Netanyahu, their first conversation in weeks, the two leaders found themselves in an unusual dynamic, engaging not as partners but against the backdrop of historic tensions.

Once touting their friendly relationship – Netanyahu has used billboards showing himself next to Putin during election campaigning in Israel, even last year – the events of 7 October and Russia’s pro-Palestinian stance in the aftermath have brought a decisive schism in their ties.

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Hamas leaders attend Egypt talks as Israeli attacks push deeper into Gaza

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UN says about 100,000 people have arrived in Rafah after intense attacks on Deir al-Balah and Khan Younis

• Israel-Gaza war – live updates

A delegation of high-level Hamas leaders is visiting Egypt for talks aimed at bringing the devastating war in Gaza to an end, even as the Israeli military pushes deeper into the centre and south of the strip, displacing tens of thousands of people.

The UN’s humanitarian office said on Friday that over the past few days an estimated 100,000 people had arrived in Rafah, Gaza’s southernmost town on the border with Egypt, after an intense new ground and aerial offensive around the central town of Deir al-Balah and airstrikes on the southern town of Khan Younis.

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Israeli airstrike kills Gaza aid worker and 70 of his extended family, UN says

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Call to protect civilians and humanitarian staff after UNDP’s Issam al-Mughrabi, his wife, children and scores of relatives killed

An Israeli military airstrike killed more than 70 members of an extended family, including a veteran UN aid worker, as the UN secretary general warned that the scale of death and destruction inside Gaza is blocking delivery of desperately needed aid.

Issam al-Mughrabi, 56, was killed with his wife, five children and dozens of other relatives in a bombing near Gaza City, said the head of the UN development programme (UNDP) in a statement that also called for an urgent ceasefire.

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Israel widens ground offensive in Gaza as UN aid resolution talks continue

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More evacuations ordered in west of strip, 11 weeks into war that has now killed nearly 1% of people in Gaza

Israel is expanding its ground offensive in Gaza, ordering new evacuations in the west of the strip, as UN security council negotiations over a resolution intended to increase the flow of humanitarian supplies stretched into another day.

Israel’s military told people to leave their homes in al-Bureij, an urban refugee camp. It also said extra ground troops would head to fight in southern Khan Younis. Both areas were originally declared safe for civilians fleeing from the north.

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Biden administration policy differences reportedly behind delay in Gaza ceasefire vote at UN

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Work continues on UN security council text of resolution that the US could at least abstain on, as Qatar says hostage talks have been ‘positive’

A vote on a Gaza ceasefire resolution was postponed for a second time at the UN security council on Tuesday, amid reported policy differences inside the Biden administration.

While diplomatic efforts struggled in New York in the pursuit of a formalised truce, there was a renewed push for a new hostage deal that would involve a short humanitarian pause in the fight to allow an exchange with Palestinian prisoners.

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MPs clash in Commons as government urged to back instant Gaza ceasefire

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Lib Dem MP Layla Moran describes desperate plight of relatives in Gaza after she was granted urgent question on situation

The Liberal Democrat MP Layla Moran has made an impassioned plea in the House of Commons for the government to back an immediate ceasefire in Gaza as she told of the desperate plight of relatives who had taken refuge in a church there.

Those inside the Holy Family parish in Gaza City were down to their last can of corn, she told the development minister, Andrew Mitchell, who will meet her on Wednesday. Two women were allegedly killed by an Israeli military sniper in the church on Saturday.

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Gulf states press for two-state roadmap after UN vote on Israel-Gaza war

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UAE and Qatar say they will not again fund Gaza reconstruction without Israeli concession, as US isolation grows

Gulf states are capitalising on the resounding vote at the UN general assembly in favour of calling for a humanitarian ceasefire in Gaza by warning the US they will not once again fund the reconstruction of Gaza unless Israel agrees to a published roadmap to a two-state solution.

In Israel the general assembly vote was dismissed as a further sign of anti-Israeli bias at the UN. But with the US national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, due to visit the region, pressure is building on Israel to show greater flexibility about what will constitute a military victory and how Gaza will be administered once the war ends.

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New Jersey Arab Americans go on strike over Gaza: ‘The administration isn’t listening’

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Paterson residents describe ‘anger, sadness, desperation’ after US vetoes UN resolution calling for ceasefire

A general strike called after the US blocked a UN resolution calling for a permanent ceasefire in Gaza took hold across New Jersey’s Arab American communities on Monday, in the latest expression of opposition to Israel’s devastating military offensive in the Palestinian territory.

Along Palestine Way in the city of Paterson, dozens of business owners, community leaders and families with young children, swathed in keffiyeh scarves against the cold, heeded the call from Palestinian leaders to show, in symbolic, political and economic terms, deepening anger and distress about an Israeli military operation that began after a Hamas cross-border attack on 7 October.

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Cop28: ‘failure is not an option,’ says summit president – as it happened

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Sultan Al Jaber calls for countries to come together amid disagreements over the future of climate action

• China ‘would like to see agreement to substitute renewables for fossil fuels’

There is some more food-related news from the conference today, writes Fiona Harvey.

The Alliance of Champions for Food Systems Transformation (ACF) launched on Sunday, a group that’s being called the “high ambition coalition for food”. It has Brazil, Sierra Leone and Norway as co-chairs, and other prominent members include Rwanda and Cambodia.

Strengthen national visions and food systems transformation pathways, inclusive of 10 priority action areas and consistent with science-based targets.

Update Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs), National Adaptation Plans (NAPs), Long-Term Low Emission Development Strategies (LT-LEDS),​​ and National Biodiversity Strategies and Action Plans (NBSAPs) in line with these updated National Food System Transformation Pathways and/or Implementation Plans, by 2025 at the latest.

Report annually on targets and priority intervention areas

“Peasant family farmers, Indigenous and local communities, forest collectors, pastoralists, fisherfolk, and agricultural workers, are among the populations most harshly affected by climate change worldwide. Yet they are also the central actors who can sustainably transform food systems. Supporting their livelihoods through specifically tailored public policies is essential to achieve an agroecological transition towards healthy, resilient and sustainable food systems.”

Let’s face it: climate summits are broken. The delegates talk and talk, while Earth systems slide towards deadly tipping points. Since the climate negotiations began in 1992 more carbon dioxide from burning fossil fuels has been released worldwide than in all preceding human history. This year is likely to set a new emissions record. They are talking us to oblivion.

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‘Come with solutions’: Cop28 president calls for compromise in final meetings

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Sultan Al Jaber urges nations to be flexible as talks reach impasse over whether to phase out or phase down fossil fuels

Ministers and negotiators must come to the vital final meetings of Cop28 without prepared statements, without rigid red lines, and be prepared to compromise, the president of the UN climate summit has said.

Sultan Al Jaber, whose position is now pivotal to the talks as they enter their final days, on Sunday convened a majlis of all countries, a meeting in the traditional form of an elders’ conference in the United Arab Emirates.

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