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Marking one year since the tragic killings in the eastern Uzbek city of Andijan, in which hundreds of people reportedly lost their lives, United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Louise Arbour today conveyed her deep sympathy to all the families affected, saying the consequences of these tragic events continue to be widely felt.

Aiming to advance international efforts on climate change, representatives of governments from across the globe will gather in Bonn next week under United Nations auspices to discuss new proposals, including a significant increase in the levels of emission reductions required under the Kyoto Protocol, a senior official dealing with the issue said today.

The United Nations Commission on Sustainable Development today in New York concluded a two-week review of ways to help the 1.6 billion people who presently lack access to electricity, including through the development of new technologies, market incentives and cooperation among developing countries.

More than 1,200 representatives of the world’s indigenous people kick off a 12-day meeting at the United Nations on Monday, naming education, health, human rights and the environment as among the major challenges they face in trying to improve their situation by the 2015 deadline for achieving the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).

United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan today spotlighted the “grave and growing problem” of unemployed youth and called for a broad-based response involving governments, unions, businesses and civil society at large.

Despite the laudable efforts of Iraq’s public distribution of food, many of Iraq’s poorer households still lack enough to eat, the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) said today, citing a new food security and vulnerability analysis.

In a step forward for the nascent United Nations Peacebuilding Commission – a body created in response to a call by the 2005 World Summit – seven countries were today elected by the Economic and Social Council to serve on its organizational committee.

Faced with one of the highest child mortality rates in the world even in the best of times, Angola is struggling to contain the impact of the current cholera outbreak on children, with 35 per cent of victims there under the age of five, according to the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), which is rushing aid to the country in response.

The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) said today it would resume aid in the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) within two weeks after reaching an accord in months of negotiations on new working arrangements, including some on-site monitoring, following the Government’s decision last year to end emergency assistance.

Although large-scale human rights violations decreased in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) from April to December 2005 compared with 2004, there was an increase in individual cases of summary executions, torture, rape and other serious abuses by police and army troops, according to the latest United Nations update on the issue.