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Facing a shortfall in donations, the United Nation's World Food Programme (WFP) warned today that its operations to feed 100,000 refugees in Nepal and nearly 400,000 people in Myanmar would be severely hampered unless contributions from international donor countries are secured by the end of the month.

Ousted Iraqi President Saddam Hussein’s government failed to return most of the Kuwaiti property seized during its 1990–91 occupation of its neighbour despite some “limited cooperation” prior to the recent hostilities, according to the latest United Nations report on the issue.

With an expected 25 per cent shortfall in international rice purchases, 150,000 people in Timor-Leste could face food shortages this year after a two-year drought and a lack of seeds, according to a special report by the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) and the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO).

The head of the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) today called on African leaders to embrace child-centred standards as the primary indicator of progress across their continent.

The main United Nations relief agency for Palestine refugees today protested Israel’s border restrictions that prevented its entire headquarters management, including a UN Under-Secretary-General, from attending its quarterly meeting, the first time in its 53-year history that the high-level session has had to be cancelled.

Acting on the recommendation of Secretary-General Kofi Annan, the Security Council today extended the mandate of the United Nations Peacekeeping Force in Cyprus (UNFICYP) until 15 December.

A former chief of the State Security Services in the Republic of Serbia was transferred today to the United Nations International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) detention unit where he awaits trial for crimes against humanity and other war crimes.

While welcoming the arrival in Bunia of advance elements of a United Nations-backed emergency force, the world body's leading expert on human rights in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) today said she was still concerned about the dramatic humanitarian situation unfolding throughout the country's war-ravaged northeast.

Four members of the United Nations Observer Mission in Georgia (UNOMIG) taken hostage last week have been released unharmed, the mission said today.

Calling such attacks "utterly reprehensible," United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan today condemned "in the strongest possible terms" the suicide bombing by the Palestinian militant group Hamas in Jerusalem, saying such actions "only serve to spur further hatred and mistrust."