General News

World-renowned conductor Daniel Barenboim on Saturday called on global powers with influence to help stop the Israeli-Palestinian conflict because, as he put it, the two sides had “lost the feeling” that they needed to agree to a peace deal.

Speaking ahead of a concert at the UN to celebrate World Human Rights Day on 10 December, the maestro insisted that the problem could not be solved by either the Israelis or the Palestinians, who both preferred the existing status quo “better than any development”.

An unprecedented call for action to stop suffering by ending conflict has been issued by the Secretary-General of the United Nations, Ban Ki-moon, along with the head of the International Committee for the Red Cross (ICRC), Peter Maurer.

Speaking together at the UN in Geneva, both men warned that a disregard for basic humanity now reigned, with Mr Ban insisting: “Even war has rules.”

Social protection systems must address the unique needs of persons with disabilities. That’s according to Catalina Devandas Aguilar, the UN’s Special Rapporteur on the issue.

Ensuring social protection schemes take into account persons with disabilities can help prevent their exclusion or marginalization in societies as a whole.

The situation for children in Iraq has been described as “absolutely devastating” by the UN Children’s Fund, UNICEF.

The agency says that ongoing conflict in the country is keeping two million young people out of school.

UNICEF has built 40 new schools, set up temporary ones, and distributed educational materials to more than 200,000 children, but says it needs US$68 million by the end of the year to carry on with its work.

The whole future of the UN is at stake over the modernizing of its peacekeeping operations to face new challenges.

That’s according to the Deputy Secretary-General on Friday, addressing a meeting on the future of peacekeeping around the world.

A top-to-bottom review is underway across the whole of the UN, following a recent report by the Secretary-General .

Matthew Wells reports.

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Countries should do more to protect their citizens facing the death penalty abroad. That’s according to a new report released by the UN’s top expert on executions.

The UN Special Rapporteur on executions, Christoph Heyns, has highlighted that hundreds of foreign nationals face the death penalty after trials that fail to reach the highest – or in some cases – even the lowest standards of fairness.

Eighteen United Nations peacekeepers taken hostage in South Sudan earlier in the week have been set free, the UN has confirmed.

But 12 South Sudanese contractors working with the peacekeepers are still being held.

All 30 were taken hostage earlier this week by heavily-armed opposition SPLA forces, which accused them of transporting weapons.

The UN Mission in South Sudan, (UNMISS), denies the claims and said the group was transporting fuel, not weapons.

The portraits of former UN Secretaries-General that are hanging in UN headquarters in New York serve to celebrate the organization’s core values.

That’s according to an art historian and portrait expert who has been taking a look at the paintings of the seven former UN chiefs.

As the United Nations celebrates its 70^th anniversary, Daniel Dickinson asked New York University’s Professor Kenneth Silver what he thinks of the portraits.

After 25 years of conflict and misery, the Somali people see an end in sight.

That’s according to John Ging, head of operations at the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA).

He was speaking at UN headquarters after returning from a fact-finding visit to Sudan, South Sudan and Somalia.

He said that each faced a unique set of challenges, but more help from donors was urgently needed to protect civilians from the effects of conflict and climate change.

A train known as the UN70 Belarus Express is helping to spread the word about the new Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) throughout the Eastern European country.

The train has been making its way around Belarus this week.

Film screenings, concerts, exhibitions and workshops on the goals have all been featured on board, in eight different cities.

The 17 development and poverty reduction targets which make up the SDGs were agreed by the international community in September.