Interviews

The vast majority of the world’s nearly 26 million refugees are hosted in the Global South where providing education for them is a major challenge, the UN refugee agency (UNHCR) said on Friday.

In an interview with UN News’s Daniel Johnson, the agency’s Mamadou Dian Balde (Deputy Director, UNHCR Division of Resilience and Solutions) explains how a new plan is helping to provide not just primary but also secondary schooling to vulnerable youngsters.

Yinka Lawanson Lamboginny, known as ‘Lambo’, is a Nigerian musician who raises money to bring music therapy programs to youth prisons, through his NGO SALT (Saving All lives Together).

He was invited to the United Nations Civil Society Conference to talk about prison reform.

Conor Lennon from UN News met Yinka at the event, and asked him why he is so passionate about the subject.
 

Saudi women will now be able to apply for passports. Those over 21 will be allowed to travel independently, without permission from their so-called guardians.

Other steps taken by the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia over the past few years in advancing women’s rights include giving women the freedom to continue their education, and to seek employment without having to guarantee permission from a male relative.

Fighting corruption is particularly important in countries recovering from conflict, where scarce resources need to be directed to those in need, rather than being diverted to those in power, Mirella Dummar-Frahi, from the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), said in an interview with UN News.

Speaking to Conor Lennon from UN News, at the UN Civil Society Conference, in Salt Lake City, USA, Ms. Dummar-Frahi, who runs the Civil Society Partnership Team at UNODC, said that, in these countries, corruption can be a driver of conflict.
 

With Zimbabwe experiencing its worst-ever hunger crisis, the United Nations and its relief partners have revised their humanitarian appeal to scale up food assistance to people most affected by drought, flooding, and economic stagnation.

We cannot conceive of a United Nations that is talking about the challenges of humankind that relate to sustainability, without involving civil society, according to Maruxa Cardama, chairperson of the 68^th UN Civil Society Conference, taking place in the Salt Lake City, Utah, between 26-28 August.

Conor Lennon from UN News spoke to Ms. Cardama, who is also Secretary-General of the Partnership on Sustainable, Low Carbon Transport, at the Conference.

He started by asking her why the UN needs to forge closer links with civil society.

Adiba Qasim is an inspiration.

After fleeing an ISIL terrorist massacre in northern Iraq that claimed dozens of family members in 2014, at just 19 years old, she became a humanitarian worker to help other women who’d endured unimaginable horrors at their hands.

Today, Adiba is in Switzerland, where she’s studying hard to become a lawyer – and where she spoke to UN News’s Daniel Johnson at an event to celebrate World Humanitarian Day.

Twenty-five years ago, the UN Education, Science and Culture Organization (UNESCO) launched the ‘Slave Route Project: Resistance, Liberty, Heritage’, a landmark initiative that helped break the silence surrounding the slave trade and slavery.

The International Day for the Remembrance of the Slave Trade and its Abolition, celebrated on 23 August, marks the anniversary of the 1791 insurrection of enslaved men and women in the western part of the island of Santo Domingo, which, on proclaiming its independence, reverted to its original Amerindian name: Haiti.

The arms trade involves almost every country in the world, but more action is needed to consider how the $100 billion a year industry impacts on gender-based violence, the head of a key treaty said on Thursday.

In an interview with UN News’s Daniel Johnson, Ambassador Jānis Kārkliņš of Latvia, President of the 5th Arms Trade Treaty Conference of States Parties meeting in Geneva next week, explains how for the first time, the treaty’s signatories are expected to agree to look at gender as a criteria for weapons exports in future.

The senior UN official tasked with overseeing a plan of action to ensure that religious sites are safe, and that worshippers can observe their rituals in peace, has delivered a draft to the Secretary-General, following consultations with governments, religious leaders, faith-based organizations and other relevant stakeholders.

Miguel Angel Moratinos, the High Representative for the United Nations Alliance of Civilizations (UNAOC), spoke to UN News on the first-ever International Day Commemorating the Victims of Acts of Violence Based on Religion or Belief.