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Angelina Jolie, actress and United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) Goodwill Ambassador, today wrapped up her first visit to Iraq and Syria, where she spoke with Iraqi refugees who have fled the violence in their home country.

The United Nations World Health Organization (WHO) is assisting the Iraqi Government in responding to a recent outbreak of cholera in the northern governorate of Sulemaniyah which has already claimed 10 lives and left thousands ill.

Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon today expressed concern about the rising tensions and violence over the past week in Sierra Leone, which earlier this month held its first presidential and parliamentary polls since United Nations peacekeepers departed in 2005.

Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon leaves United Nations Headquarters tonight for a working trip that will begin in Turin, Italy, with a three-day retreat of senior UN staff and then follow with a visit to Sudan, Chad and Libya to observe first-hand the crises in Darfur and eastern Chad and the post-conflict situation in southern Sudan.

United Nations Emergency Relief Coordinator John Holmes has voiced his concern over the expulsion from Sudan of CARE’s Paul Barker, and urged that the matter be resolved quickly so that the Country Director of one of the world’s largest international non-governmental organizations (NGOs) can resume vital humanitarian work.

A United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) official today repeated his call for his agency’s staff, trucks carrying food aid and its partners to have unhindered access to deliver urgently-needed humanitarian assistance to flood-impacted people in the Terai region of Nepal.

The United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) is appealing for $850,000 in emergency funding to ensure that up to 250,000 victims of the recent earthquake in Peru receive critical health services.

Deploring clashes among opposing factions of the armed forces in the volatile east of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), the United Nations peacekeeping mission in the vast country today said that it is fully committed to helping find a peaceful solution to protect civilians from further violence.

The substantive dialogue developing between Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, as well as recent intensive efforts at international diplomacy, means the United Nations envoy to the Middle East is “guardedly optimistic” about the prospects for the region, he told the Security Council today.

The United Nations envoy to Liberia has called for an end to violence against women, while stressing that security is paramount for everyone throughout the West African nation as it works to rebuild after a brutal 14-year civil war.