Latest News

The United Nations Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) today welcomed the recent judgment by the Court of Appeal of Malaysia that declared unconstitutional the criminalization of Muslim transgender women for cross-dressing.

In the wake of car bombings in Tripoli and deadly clashes between rival armed groups in cities across long-troubled Libya, the United Nations human rights office today voiced alarm over escalating violence in the long-troubled country, while the Organization’s refugee agency warned that mounting insecurity is taking a toll on humanitarian operations.

The United Nations Human Rights Office (OHCHR) today cautioned against jumping to conclusions regarding the “complex and ongoing” investigation into the disappearance of 43 students in Mexico, amid reports that a number badly burned bodies have been recovered from sites in Guerrero state.

Allegations of the mass rape of 200 women and girls in a town in North Darfur continue raise concerns in the war-torn Sudanese region as the African Union-United Nations hybrid mission there presses ahead with its efforts “to shed further light” on the reports.

Shocking accounts of the use of terror by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) to subjugate Syrians living under its control were revealed by United Nations human rights investigators today who said the group’s “calculated use of public brutality” to spread fear routinely includes public beheading, shooting and stoning of civilians and captured fighters.

An upsurge in fish farming is expected to provide millions of people in developing countries with better access to improved nutrition over the coming decade, a new report released by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) has confirmed.

Starting tomorrow, about half a million refugees, mainly from Somalia and South Sudan, living in the Dadaab and Kakuma camps in remote areas in northern Kenya will receive reduced rations from the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) as a result of insufficient funding.

As the world copes with infectious diseases such as influenza, malaria and the Ebola virus, World Diabetes Day is a reminder that non-communicable diseases pose an even greater threat to human health, United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said today.

The illegal killing of elephants for their ivory is now at “critically high levels” in Africa with increased involvement by organized crime groups, leading to their possible extinction in parts of the continent, the UN Office for Drugs and Crime (UNODC) said today.

The top United Nations coordinator for cholera response in Haiti says support for initiatives to combat the disease has been “disappointing,” noting that while it may be possible to eliminate cholera in about a decade, at the current rate of funding, it would take more than 40 years to do the job.