This is the News in Brief, from the United Nations.
Hurricane Dorian: UN worried ‘for every person’ in eye of storm
Renewed warnings of deadly destruction in the Bahamas caused by hurricane Dorian have been issued by UN agencies and partners, who said on Tuesday that they’re worried “for every single” person in its path.
In Geneva, Jens Laerke from the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said that initial assessments from Grand Bahama and the Abaco Islands - where the storm made landfall were “rather catastrophic”.
“As we heard, it made landfall in the Abaco Islands; the population there is a little more than 17,000 people, we are concerned for all of them. It is now over the Grand Bahama, the population there is about 51,000 people and we are concerned for every one of them.”
Classified initially as a Category 5 hurricane at the weekend when it hit the Bahamas with wind gusts of over 320 kilometres per hour, Dorian has now been downgraded two notches.
But it still has the potential to be deadly, regardless of its rating, UN weather experts have warned, amid reports that some 13,000 homes have been severely damaged or destroyed.
Initial assessments carried out by the World Food Programme (WFP) with the Caribbean Disaster Management Agency (CDEMA) and other humanitarian partners, indicate that Abaco likely required food for more than 14,000 people and Grand Bahama for over 47,000.
Nowhere safe to hide in war-torn Yemen, say independent rights experts
The people of Yemen have been subject to “numerous” possible war crimes in recent years including forced recruitment of children and the bombing of a cholera treatment centre, UN-appointed experts said on Tuesday.
In an appeal to the international community to do more to end the conflict between the Government and Houthi forces, the rights specialists insisted that there had been “a pervasive lack of accountability” for these alleged crimes.
They also said that assessments that many thousands of people had been killed “are likely to be a gross underestimate”.
Here’s international expert Melissa Parke speaking to journalists in Geneva: “We’ve had incidents this year where the Coalition has struck an MSF cholera treatment centre just prior to it opening for business, so taking that out of action for the year. And we’ve had both sides of the parties to the conflict actively impeding the delivery of cholera vaccines to the population of Yemen.”
The panel, which reports to the Human Rights Council, also insisted that missiles, airstrikes and snipers target people going about their daily business, giving the impression that nowhere in Yemen is safe.
UK economy could lose almost $2 billion in exports, post-Brexit
And finally, the United Kingdom could lose close to $2 billion in exports unless more roll-over trade deals are concluded before Brexit, or the day the UK plans to leave the European Union, according to new research from UN trade body, UNCTAD.
Although some bilateral deals have been done with several countries which would allow the UK to continue with preferential access to the huge EU market, about 20 per cent of UK non-EU exports are at risk of facing higher tariffs from countries such as Turkey, South Africa, Canada and Mexico.
The UNCTAD research published on Tuesday shows that if more agreements are not concluded by exit day, it could cost the UK economy almost $2 billion, with sectors such as apparel, textiles, motor vehicles and processed food products facing higher tariffs.
Losses could be as high as $750 million in the motor vehicles sector alone, UNCTAD estimates.
These outcomes pale in comparison to the export losses that the UK will experience in the EU market in the case of a so-called “no-deal” Brexit.
UNCTAD’s research indicates that would result in UK losses of at least $16 billion, representing an approximate 7 per cent loss of overall UK exports to the EU.
Daniel Johnson, UN News.
