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With wild birds spreading the avian flu virus further into Africa and Europe, the United Nations system was stepping up assistance to countries in their efforts to contain the virus in birds and conducting simulation exercises to prepare strategies for quick action on a human future pandemic, the official in charge of the effort said today.

Wrapping up a mission to Sudan, a United Nations independent human rights expert today reported that the country’s intelligence structures continue targeting activists.

Terming yesterday “a sad day” for the children of Gaza after five were killed in conflict-related incidents, the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) today called for all efforts to be made to protect youngsters from violence and to guarantee their rights to education, health and play.

The international community must increase its support to Central Africa at a crucial time in its troubled history as the region makes the precarious transition from war to peace while being struck hard by drought, the United Nations top refugee official has declared.

The massive influx of refugees from Sudan’s war-torn Darfur region into eastern Chad, one of the world’s most arid and poorest regions, is damaging the environment and leading to tensions with the local population, a senior United Nations refugee official has warned.

By the end of the year at least 30 per cent of seats on all public buses in Afghanistan will be reserved for women under an ambitious United Nations-backed programme launched in a country where drivers now speed past stops if only women are waiting while men refuse to give up seats for women and barge past them to board.

Aiming to keep step with the shift at the United Nations from bureaucratic tasks to life-saving work in the field, Secretary-General Kofi Annan today presented proposals for a far-reaching overhaul ranging from setting up a 2,500-strong core of mobile peacekeeping professionals to multimillion dollar investments in training and technology.

Racism and racial discrimination are on the upswing and becoming widespread throughout the world, with the current global situation confirming the worst expectations that man's worst tendencies are created in the womb, a United Nations expert on racism warned today.

For the third time in a week, United Nations human rights officials have condemned the leftist Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia – Popular Army (FARC-EP) for attacks on civilians.

Presenting a set of recommendations to achieve wide-ranging management reform at the United Nations, Secretary-General Kofi Annan today appealed to Member States in the General Assembly to join forces and work constructively towards the shared goal of a stronger Organization that is better equipped to meet the needs of the world’s people.