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A top United Nations official today called for progress to be made in implementing a January Security Council resolution – which calls for a durable ceasefire in Gaza, free access for relief workers and the re-opening of crossings – to break the current impasse and lift the cloud of uncertainty hanging over the region.

The humanitarian and security situation for civilians caught up in fighting between Government forces and separatist Tamil rebels in northern Sri Lanka remains precarious, a United Nations spokesperson said today.

The powerful sounds of musicians, drummers and steel bands echoed through the United Nations complex in New York today in a celebration of the world’s common humanity and in commemoration of the victims of the African slave trade.

As the economic crisis engulfing the world continues to intensify, it could potentially herald political instability and social unrest, Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said today, calling for a four-pronged strategy to prevent the onset of new catastrophes.

The head of the United Nations labour agency has urged governments to aim their economic rescue packages at forestalling a “prolonged and severe” jobs crisis that would lead to a massive increase in unemployment.

A new United Nations report notes that the percentage of the global population falling ill to tuberculosis is dropping annually, but Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said today that the pace of the disease’s decline is too slow and that efforts to combat it are “falling short.”

The top United Nations envoy in Iraq today condemned “in the strongest terms” a suicide bomb attack that killed and injured dozens of people at a house filled with Kurdish funeral mourners yesterday.

The United Nations envoy for Afghanistan is in Washington D.C. this week ahead of a key international meeting later this month which will assess the current political, security and development issues in the South Asian nation.

The top United Nations envoy to the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) has hailed an accord signed yesterday between the Government and a rebel group that was a key combatant in fierce fighting, which uprooted hundreds of thousands of people last year, in the country’s east.

The number of people seeking asylum in industrialized countries rose in 2008 for the second year in a row, partly due to an increase in applications by people from Afghanistan, Somalia and other countries experiencing turmoil or conflict, says a new United Nations report.