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After decreasing by 21 per cent in 2005, the cultivated area of opium in Afghanistan, the world’s largest supplier of the drug from which heroin is produced, looks likely to rise this year, a United Nations spokesman said today.

Amid findings released today showing that aid donors are overlooking Asia in favour of Africa, the head of the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (UNESCAP) told high-level delegates at a London conference that the region should get “a better deal.”

With the situation between the formerly warring countries of Ethiopia and Eritrea still deadlocked, the top United Nations force commander in the region has voiced hope for a breakthrough in the peace process.

Visiting northwestern Liberia, the senior United Nations envoy to the country has assured residents that the international community will continue to support and protect them, the UN peacekeeping mission there (UNMIL) reported this weekend.

The United Nations refugee agency today voiced serious concern over the safety of thousands of Palestinian refugees in Iraq, some of whom have reportedly been directly targeted and killed in the continuing violence there.

After witnessing the optimism of refugees returning home and the despair of other groups fleeing drought and hunger in Africa's Great Lakes Region, the head of the United Nations refugee agency said today that only a regional approach could address the complex causes of displacement.

Faced with the threat of nuclear terrorism and the risk of accidents at atomic power stations, senior regulators from some 60 countries wrapped up a week-long United Nations-sponsored meeting in Moscow today aimed at reinforcing nuclear safety and security around the world.

Governments have answered an urgent appeal by the United Nations refugee agency to help fly about 150 tonnes of relief supplies to some 60,000 Sahrawi refugees left homeless by severe flooding in three camps in western Algeria, the agency said today.

A United Nations special envoy today completed a five-day visit to Serbia and Kosovo following last month’s first round of direct talks between the two sides on the final status of the Albanian-majority Serbian province, which the UN has run ever since Yugoslav troops were driven out in 1999 amid grave rights abuses in ethnic fighting.

With meteorologists predicting a fierce hurricane season this year, the United Nations Emergency Relief Coordinator today in Guatemala met with victims of a recent storm, capping his recent efforts to spotlight the region’s need for preparedness.