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United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon today told the Security Council that stepping up efforts to resolve the Darfur crisis is one of his top priorities, warning of an ever worsening humanitarian crisis in this strife-torn part of Sudan, as he also highlighted the Middle East and UN peacekeeping worldwide as other key challenges.

The United Nations envoy for Somalia today attended the Peace and Security Commission meeting in Addis Ababa of the African Union (AU), which is discussing responses to the situation in the troubled Horn of Africa country.

The United Nations Observer Mission in Georgia (UNOMIG) today condemned an attack on a checkpoint that left one policeman dead and another wounded, calling on the Government and Abkhaz separatists to prevent a further escalation of violence.

United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon today urged the Government of Iraq to grant a stay of execution to those whose death sentences may be carried out in the near future.

United Nations agencies are helping to draw up an action plan to fight a new outbreak of Rift Valley Fever (RVF) in the Horn of Africa amid concerns that climate change with successive droughts and floods, some of it human-caused, could increase the 5-15 year cyclical frequency of the sometimes fatal viral haemorrhagic disease.

United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon today called for the reinstatement of Fiji’s “legitimate authority,” following the announcement that the leader of last December’s coup d’état has become Prime Minister of the country.

The United Nations Stabilization Mission in Haiti (MINUSTAH) and the country’s national police have arrested a gang member wanted in connection with the killing last November of two blue helmets serving with the peacekeeping operation.

Tanzanian Foreign Minister Asha-Rose Migiro today became the third person – and second woman – in history appointed United Nations Deputy Secretary-General when she accepted the post offered to her by Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon.

The Secretary-General’s Special Envoy for Darfur heads to Sudan and neighbouring Ethiopia tonight for almost a week of talks and meetings with officials from the Sudanese Government, the African Union (AU) and other groups to discuss how to find a lasting solution to the conflict that has left at least 200,000 people dead and displaced more than 2 million others.

Continuing United Nations efforts to make the world body more transparent, Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, who took the rein on 1 January, has already submitted his financial disclosure form to the Ethics Office, his spokesperson said today, adding that he encourages all senior officials to be similarly open.