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Unanimously adopting two separate resolutions on Libya, the Security Council, in the first, called for an immediate and unconditional ceasefire and extended the United Nations Support Mission there (UNSMIL) until 15 September, and in the second, adjusted the arms embargo on the country in light of the terrorist threat there.

With a raft of ills plaguing the Arab world – from the “shameful” conflict in Syria to the “tinderbox” that is Gaza and the steadily unraveling situation in Yemen – Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon today called upon leaders gathered in Egypt to work with each other and the United Nations to “strengthen our bonds for the people of this region and the security of our world.”

The top United Nations official in Somalia along with the members of the UN Security Council have strongly condemned yesterday's terrorist attack on a hotel in Mogadishu city that resulted in the death of many civilians, including the Somali Federal Government's Permanent Representative to the UN Office in Geneva, Ambassador Yusuf Bari-Bari.

The United Nations will go dark later this evening as the Organization shuts off the lights at its iconic Headquarters complex in New York and other facilities around the world in observance of 'Earth Hour,' an annual global event raising awareness about the need to take action on climate change and promoting sustainable energy consumption.

Taking an innovative step to support Iraqi youth and to mobilize young people worldwide for the protection of cultural heritage, Irina Bokova, Director-General of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) launched today at Baghdad University #Unite4Heritage, a social media campaign to counter the propaganda of cultural cleansing.

On the eve of presidential and parliamentary elections in Nigeria, Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has called on all Nigerians to exercise their civic responsibility by going to the polls to vote in large numbers.

The United Nations-backed court set up to bring to trial those most responsible for crimes committed during Cambodia’s Khmer Rouge regime today announced charges against former member Ao An of “crimes against humanity of murder, extermination, persecution on political and religious grounds, imprisonment, and other inhumane acts” committed at three sites.

Ahead of next week’s third International Humanitarian Pledging Conference for Syria, the United Nations health agency’s top official in the country said today that more than 16 million Syrians and Syrian refugees are in need of health support, but that she had so far received no new funding to meet the $124 million needed to finance humanitarian operations in the country this year.

The United Nations refugee agency (UNHCR) has today strongly condemned the recent kidnapping of Congolese refugees by the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), calling for an immediate release of those still in captivity.

The United Nations Human Rights office today welcomed Malawi President Peter Mutharika's strong statement condemning the recent spate of attacks on people with albinism in his country and urged that the measures he outlined to arrest those responsible for such attacks and better protect albinos be launched “without delay.”