General News

Reducing the number of women in jail around the world needs to become a bigger priority, according to a panel meeting at the United Nations this week.

Women face discrimination, and censure if they end up in prison, the event heard, regardless of where they live.

The event here at UN headquarters in New York, was organized by the Thailand Institute of Justice, together with the pressure group Penal Reform International.

Matthew Wells asked the group’s Olivia Rope, why it was important to highlight this issue now.

Duration: 3’00”

More than US$105 million pledged for Somali refugees

More than US$105 million has been pledged at an international conference designed to help support Somali refugees.  The conference held jointly between the United Nations and European Union was held Wednesday in Belgium.

In opening the event, the head of the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) said on-going conflict in Somalia had produced the “second largest protracted” refugee situation in the world.

Although women are outpacing men in achieving higher levels of education, they are still more likely to pursue the humanities as opposed to science, technology, engineering and mathematics.

That’s according to the World’s Women 2015, a UN report which looks at how women worldwide are faring in eight critical areas such as health, education, work, power and decision-making, and poverty.

The important role nuclear power could play in reducing greenhouse gas emissions is the focus of a new report released by the UN Nuclear Agency, the IAEA.

The Climate Change and Nuclear Power 2015 report studies the various designs of nuclear power plants in relation to their greenhouse gas emissions.

Women around the world are living longer than ever, but still face formidable challenges when it comes to issues of equality.

That’s just one of the findings of a new report on the lives of women released by the United Nations on Tuesday.

The “World’s Women 2015” report takes a comprehensive view of the state of women’s affairs globally, based on data and statistics gathered from all around the world.

The number of refugees and migrants arriving in Greece this year has surpassed the half-million mark, the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) said on Tuesday.

The agency said that the current spike in arrivals to Greece from countries including Syria and Afghanistan, was putting huge pressure on the Greek islands.

UNHCR’s Ron Redmond has been to the island of Lesvos, where the majority of people are arriving.

Daniel Dickinson asked him for an update.

Globally, 1.2 million people die each year on the roads, taking an “unacceptable toll” on communities. That’s according to a newly released report from the World Health Organization (WHO), which says that people in developing countries are disproportionately suffering from preventable deaths on the roads.

If there's one country that exemplifies the difficulty in transforming mineral wealth into inclusive growth, it's the Democratic Republic of Congo; that’s according to the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

The IMF's latest annual economic assessment indicates while growth rates in the African country for 2014 were as high as 9.2 per cent, the poverty rate is still one of the worst in the world.

Bruce Edwards has been speaking to Norbert Toé, IMF mission chief for The Democratic Republic of the Congo.

The powerful image of young children holding lanterns at a refugee settlement in Lebanon has been selected as a winning entry in a photo competition organized by the Beirut UN information centre.

The photo captioned “Hope, Life and Free Energy” was submitted by a young amateur photographer as part of activities organized around the 70th anniversary of the founding of the UN.

Nuclear experts are gathering at the UN in Vienna, Austria to discuss how to best prepare for and respond to a nuclear or radiological emergency.

The International Conference on Global Emergency Preparedness and Response, known as EPR, will look at the lessons learned from the Fukushima disaster in Japan in 2011.

More than 100,000 people were evacuated from the areas surrounding the nuclear facility there as a result of concerns over exposure to radioactive elements released from damaged reactors.