Interviews

More than 40 different country situations of concern will be put under the international spotlight at the Human Rights Council’s landmark 50^th session beginning on Monday, in Geneva.

Created in 2006, the forum is the most important multilateral body for the advancement of people’s freedoms, which recently have included strong and unequivocal action against racism and the challenges posed by climate change, as President of the Council, Federico Villegas tells UN News’s Daniel Johnson.

First families lose their land, then their livestock and then their children; that’s the stark reality of life right now in the Horn of Africa, where millions of people have been hit by successive failed rainy seasons.

According to UN Children’s Fund UNICEF, hundreds of thousands of Somali children are in desperate need of treatment for life-threatening severe acute malnutrition, more even than during the brutal 2011 famine.

With more details, here’s Rania Dagash, UNICEF Deputy Director for eastern and southern Africa, speaking to UN News’s Daniel Johnson.

There is room for optimism that the war in Ukraine will end, but meanwhile, the UN is planning how best to protect millions of civilians through the harsh winter that begins in just a few months’ time.

That’s according to Crisis Coordinator for Ukraine, Amin Awad, speaking exclusively to UN News, marking the 100 days since the 24 February Russian invasion of Ukraine.

Abdelmonem Makki, began by asking Mr. Awad if he thought the fighting could end anytime soon.

When your country is at war, chances are you might have other priorities than attending an event at the UN that promotes peace. 

But that’s not the case for Ukrainian teenager Daria Yelisieienko, who travelled all the way from her war-torn country this week, to show her support for United Nations peacekeepers everywhere. 

Ocean and global climate are intrinsically linked – and if the “right decisions are made at the UN Ocean Conference, the Ocean will be a big part of Portugal’s future”. 

That’s the view of Samuel Collins, a project manager at the Oceano Azul Foundation in Lisbon. 

The organization plays a big role in ocean literacy, aiming to educate a “blue generation”, works on ocean conservation, and also supports the development of startups creating products and services with positive environmental impact. 

From conserving marine biodiversity to awareness raising and seafood consumption, Associação Natureza Portugal, or ANP, runs several projects that are contributing to a healthier ocean.

Based in the coastal city of Lisbon, Portugal, the non-governmental organization works in line with the World Wildlife Fund (WWF).

Governments should recruit more women into their national forces so that they can serve at UN field operations, an award-winning peacekeeper from Zimbabwe has said. 

Major Winnet Zharare is the recipient of the 2021 Military Gender Advocate of the Year Award, presented by the UN Secretary-General during a ceremony on Thursday in observation of the International Day of UN Peacekeepers. 

Since the Russian invasion of Ukraine on 24 February, the consequences of the war have been devastating for many millions of people in then country.

Many of those forced to flee left behind friends and communities, their homes, belongings, and jobs.

The UN's Nathalie Minard spoke to Ukrainian refugees in neighbouring Poland, to find out how cash transfers from the UN are helping them, and why the UN refugee agency (UNHCR) considers cash to be the most efficient way to help vulnerable people.
 

The head of the UN weather agency, WMO, has told UN News that with the cost of renewable energy falling, and new investment from the private sector, we have the tools to limit global warming to the globally-agreed limit of 1.5 degrees Celsius.

WMO chief Petteri Taalas, was speaking on Wednesday, as the State of the Climate 2021 report showed that new records were set last year for four out of seven key climate change indicators, despite some progress in recent years.

Daniel Johnson in Geneva asked Mr. Taalas to outline the report’s main findings.

Two and a half years into the COVID-19 pandemic, it may be tempting to think that for many of us, the worst is over.