Afghanistan faces a “cultural disaster”, following the fall of Kabul to Taliban forces, a UN Special Rapporteur said on Tuesday, in a statement urging countries to provide urgent assistance to human rights defenders, including those working on women’s and cultural rights, as well as artists, trying to flee the country. 

Thousands of boys and girls have been killed or injured over the past two years in Afghanistan, according to the latest UN report on Children and Armed Conflict, which was issued on Monday, a day after the Taliban consolidated control over the country. 

As the crisis in Afghanistan deepens by the hour, with reports that insurgent forces reached the country’s capital, Kabul, earlier on Sunday, UN Secretary-General António Guterres has urged the Taliban and all other parties “to exercise utmost restraint to protect lives and ensure that humanitarian needs can be addressed.”

Rival armed groups in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) are carrying out horrific sexual attacks against women and girls, the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) warned on Friday.