Interviews

The number of people who suffer from dementia is set to triple to more than 150 million by 2050, the World Health Organization (WHO) said on Thursday.

Dementia causes a wide range of symptoms including memory loss and a decline in mental abilities.

In a bid to help the global community to prepare for the growing challenge, WHO has called on governments to pool data on the disease for the first time.

A young engineer from Yemen hopes his UN prize-winning project to convert food waste into “green” energy will help reduce the staggering rate of cholera in his country.

Omer Badokhon is one of six winners of the Young Champions of the Earth prize presented by the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) and materials science company, Covestro.

The lack of aid deliveries to Syria’s most desperate communities and a continuing veto on the evacuation of hundreds of extremely sick civilians feel like a personal “failure”, a senior humanitarian adviser to the UN said on Thursday.

Speaking to journalists in Geneva, Jan Egeland explained that in opposition-held Eastern Ghouta outside Damascus, another week has gone by without any access for aid convoys.

Migrants and refugees need to be seen as the “ultimate agents” of development across the world, said the head of the UN migration agency (IOM) on Wednesday.

William Lacey Swing was speaking on the final day of a high-level meeting being held in Mexico to prepare for the forthcoming Global Compact for Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration.

Child migrants, especially those travelling alone, deserve care and protection “every step of the way”.

That’s the key message coming from the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) in a new report entitled “Beyond Borders”.

It was one of the key discussion points at this week’s preparatory meeting for the up-coming Global Compact for Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration, which took place in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico.

Disturbing details have emerged of a little-known side to the Syrian conflict: sexual violence against boys and men.

The UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) report into the abuse was published on Wednesday, after more than 200 interviews in Iraq, Lebanon and Jordan.

Helping regions in Myanmar which are wracked by conflict move away from opium production is good for the economy and will help solidify the country’s peace process.

Although space-based applications are helping African countries to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), access remains in the “infancy” stage, according to a scientist from Kenya.

Joseph Olwendo is a lecturer at Pwani University who is researching the impact of “space weather” on satellites and other technology.

Somalia’s leaders are committed to ensuring a safe and sustainable future for the country’s people, but no-one should be under any illusion that this may take a long time, a senior UN official said on Tuesday.

Michael Keating, the Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Somalia and head of UN Mission UNSOM, has been speaking from the capital Mogadishu, where a security and humanitarian conference is under way.

Building roads, empowering young people and contributing to peace and development efforts: these are just some of the duties performed by more than 200 international and local volunteers working with the UN in Sudan.

Roughly half of these UN Volunteers are serving at the joint African Union-UN Mission in Darfur (UNAMID), in areas such as human rights, child protection and community stabilization.