‘They don’t help’: refugees condemn UN over failures that drove them to sea

Pregnant women and children among dozens forced into perilous Mediterranean crossing to escape overcrowded centre in Libya

Dozens of people who were put under pressure to leave a failing EU-funded UN refugee agency centre in Tripoli have used smugglers to cross the sea to Italy in the last month, according to refugees and aid workers.

One Somali man who spoke to the Guardian said he was among a group of more than 50 who left Libya in November and December and were rescued by ships including the Ocean Viking, the Médecins Sans Frontières and SOS Méditerranée ship, in the Mediterranean. He is now in Italy.

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Top UN official accuses US of torturing Chelsea Manning

Ex-Army intelligence analyst jailed over refusal to testify against WikiLeaks reportedly subjected to ‘severe measures of coercion’

A top United Nations official has accused the US government of using torture against Chelsea Manning, the former Army intelligence analyst currently jailed in the US over her refusal to testify against WikiLeaks.

Nils Melzer, UN special rapporteur on torture, made the charge in a letter sent in November but only released on Tuesday.

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Papers reveal Anglo-French distrust before Srebrenica massacre

Archives show British PM was warned France may have made secret deal with Bosnian Serbs

Days before the Srebrenica massacre in July 1995, John Major was warned France had possibly brokered a secret deal with the Bosnian Serbs to halt airstrikes in return for the release of western military hostages.

This claim, detailed in a secret Foreign Office note to the prime minister, is among documents available to read at the National Archives in Kew fromTuesday that expose the depth of Anglo-French distrust during the Balkans conflict.

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More than 235,000 people have fled Idlib region in Syria, says UN

Displacement follows two weeks of air and ground assaults on rebel stronghold

More than 235,000 civilians have fled their homes in opposition-held areas of north-west Syria in the past two weeks, the UN has said, after attacks by Syrian government forces intensified.

Syrian troops and their foreign backers are targeting the towns of Maaret al-Numan and Saraqeb in Idlib province, which sit on a highway connecting Aleppo with the capital, Damascus.

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UN special rapporteur condemns Jamal Khashoggi verdict as ‘whitewash’ – video

Agnès Callamard, a UN special rapporteur who led an inquiry into Saudi reporter’s killing but was barred from secretive trial, says ruling that crime was spontaneous rather than premeditated means system that allowed murder to happen remains untouched.

A court exonerated Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s inner circle of involvement in the murder at the Saudi embassy in Istanbul in October 2018 which plunged the kingdom into a diplomatic crisis

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Downward spiral of war, crisis and need to worsen in 2020, fears top UN official

UN relief chief fears women, girls and disabled people will bear brunt of continued conflict, climate and economic deprivation

The UN’s relief coordinator, Mark Lowcock, believes next year could be worse than a “terrible” 2019, when conflict, the climate emergency and economic desperation left 165 million people in need of aid.

Extreme storms, drought and other disasters driven by the climate crisis hit the world’s poorest “first and worst”, Lowcock told the Guardian, with women, girls and those with disabilities the most badly affected.

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Cross-border aid to Syria at risk amid UN security council split

Impasse continues as Russia calls for reduction in number of crossings for delivering aid

Vital cross-border aid to Syria is under threat after the UN security council was unable to overcome Russian and Chinese objections to the programme.

The aid, which is sent over borders at four UN approved checkpoints and without the formal permission of the Syrian regime, is seen as critical as the humanitarian crisis in Idlib and north-east Syria continues to mount.

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UN #MeToo whistleblower sacked for alleged sexual and financial misconduct

Martina Brostrom, who accused senior UNAids official of sexual harassment, claims her dismissal is an act of ‘retaliation’

A high-profile UN whistleblower, whose claims of sexual assault at the main agency dealing with Aids prompted a long-running scandal, has been sacked along with another colleague for alleged sexual and financial misconduct.

Martina Brostrom publicly accused a senior director at UNAids of forcibly kissing her and trying to drag her out of a Bangkok elevator in 2015. She also said he had sexually harassed her on other occasions.

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UN climate talks end with limited progress on emissions targets

Partial agreement at COP25 that countries must be more ambitious to fulfil Paris goals

Climate talks in Madrid have ended with a partial agreement to ask countries to come up with more ambitious targets to cut greenhouse gas emissions in order to meet the terms of the 2015 Paris accord.

Few countries came to this year’s talks with updated plans to reach the Paris goals, though the EU finally agreed its long-term target of reaching net zero emissions by 2050. Experts say more ambitious emissions cuts are needed globally if the Paris pledge to hold global heating to no more than 2C is to be met.

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Richer nations accused of stalling progress on climate crisis

Brazil, India and China singled out in UN talks as acting to block agreement on article 6 of Paris agreement

Poor countries have accused a handful of richer nations of holding up progress on tackling the climate crisis at UN talks in Madrid, as demonstrators and activists vented their frustration in the final hours of two weeks of negotiations.

The talks dragged on with negotiators battling into the early hours of Saturday to salvage a result, as governments wrangled over the details of a seemingly arcane issue: carbon markets, governed by a provision of the 2015 Paris agreement known as article 6.

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Traditional Thai massage gains Unesco heritage status

Practice of nuad Thai, which has gained global recognition, is added to Unesco’s ‘intangible cultural heritage’ list

The body-folding, sharp-elbowed techniques of Thai massage have been added to Unesco’s prestigious heritage list.

Originating in India and practised in Thailand for centuries, the massage was popularised when a special school opened in the 1960s to train massage therapists from around the world.

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Activists protest at ‘sidelining of social justice’ at UN climate talks

Campaigners frustrated at how women and indigenous people have struggled to have voices heard

Youth climate activists have called for a global strike on Friday to protest that human rights and social justice have been sidelined at the UN climate talks in Madrid, where governments look set to wrap up two weeks of negotiations without a breakthrough on the pressing issue of greenhouse gas reduction.

Campaigners have been frustrated not only at the slow progress of the talks but also that groups representing women, indigenous people and poor people have struggled to have their voices heard within the conference halls where the official negotiations are taking place, even while 500,000 people took part in a mass protest in the streets outside last Friday.

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UK still funding Myanmar camps despite UN boycott over conditions

Humanitarian agencies say Rohingya people displaced by violence in Rakhine state are forced to live in ‘apartheid-like’ facilities

The UK has broken ranks with the UN and is continuing to put money into squalid Rohingya “apartheid-like” camps, despite a policy designed to avoid complicity in Myanmar’s rights abuses, the Guardian has learned.

Internal briefing documents as well as interviews with UN and humanitarian agency officials in Myanmar showed the British government was maintaining a policy of providing aid and other support to displaced people living in camps in Myanmar’s Rakhine state that have been slated for closure since 2017.

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Libya arms embargo being systematically violated by UN states

Jordan, Turkey and UAE singled out for ‘routinely and blatantly’ supplying weapons

UN member states have systematically violated a Libyan arms embargo, according to a long-awaited UN report due to be published on Monday that will identify Jordan, Turkey and the United Arab Emirates as the main culprits.

The report is expected to say these three countries “routinely and sometimes blatantly supplied weapons with little effort to disguise the source”. It is also likely to link the UAE to a bombing of a detention centre that has been described as a war crime.

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The UN’s fight for Palestinian refugees goes on – but its key agency needs help

From Israel’s hostility to Trump’s withdrawal of US funding, the UNRWA faces unprecedented challenges. Timely financial and diplomatic support is key

Today, on the 70th anniversary of its founding, the UN Relief and Works Agency, the UN’s main refugee agency serving Palestinians, is facing unprecedented challenges.

It has become a key battleground in Donald Trump’s war against multilateralism and his unilateral attempts to redefine the Middle East peace process along a track proposed by Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu.

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UN peacekeepers intervene after violent clashes in South Sudan

Nepalese blue helmets deployed in Lakes state after 79 people die in fighting between Gak and Manuer communities

UN peacekeepers have been sent to South Sudan’s northern Lakes region after a series of clashes in which 79 people were killed and more than 100 injured.

With roads impassable due to heavy rains and flooding, the Nepalese blue helmets travelled by helicopter on Tuesday from Rumbek, the state capital, to Maper, about 100km north, according to the UN mission in the country, Unmiss.

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The ‘qualifications passport’ scheme breaking down barriers for migrants

Having their skills recognised is one of the main obstacles to employment faced by refugees in developed countries

The armed rebels had first ransacked the hospital where Timothée* worked as a doctor. Then, they went door to door with machetes, hunting down those seen as the wealthiest – the most educated first. When the house next door was burned down with his neighbours still inside, Timothée fled.

Without a chance to grab his passport or phone, Timothée ran through the darkness of the bush of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, knowing he might never see his family or his fiancee again.

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Kenya’s dispossessed seek redress for Britain’s ‘colonial injustices’

People whose families were brutally evicted to make way for tea plantations are taking their case for restitution to the UN

The red, fertile earth glistens in the Kenyan sun. Here in the lush green of the tea plantation uplands of Kericho County are some of the most lucrative lands in Africa.

Theaceae trees with their leathery, serrated leaves stretch in every direction. They provide tea to Europeans, making millions for the multinational companies that operate in the region. Yet for 85-year-old Peter Torongei, and thousands like him, there is very little hope. His tin shack sits firmly in the area called “Squatters Land”.

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Refugees being ‘starved out’ of UN facility in Tripoli

Aid worker claims refugees are being denied food to motivate them to leave

The UN has been accused of trying to starve out refugees and asylum seekers who are sheltering for safety inside a centre run by the UN refugee agency in the Libyan capital of Tripoli.

One group of about 400 people, who came to the Tripoli gathering and departure facility in October from Abu Salim detention centre in the south of the country, have apparently been without food for weeks.

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New UNAids chief vows to stamp out sexual misconduct and abuse of power

Winnie Byanyima says known cases of sexual harassment were ‘tip of the iceberg’ as she pledges to restore trust in organisation

The new head of scandal-hit UNAids has vowed to transform the agency’s culture to safeguard staff not only from sexual harassment – which she called “the tip of the iceberg” – but any abuse of power by those at the top.

Winnie Byanyima said she would draw on lessons learned following allegations of sexual misconduct at Oxfam, of which she was international executive director until earlier this year, to address problems at the UN agency.

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