Page 57 - United Nations

2030 development goals in trouble, 575 mn people will remain very poor: UN

In a grim report, the UN warned Monday that at the current rate of global progress 575 million people will still be living in extreme poverty and 84 million children won't be going to school in 2030 and it will take 286 years to reach equality between men and women. The report on progress in achieving 17 wide-ranging UN goals adopted by world leaders in 2015 to improve life for the world's more than 7 billion people said that only 15 per cent of some 140 specific targets that experts evaluated are on track to be reached by the end of the decade. Close to half the targets are moderately or severely off track, it said, and of those 30 per cent have either seen no movement at all or regressed including key targets on poverty, hunger and climate. The ambitious goals for 2030 include ensuring that hunger is eradicated and nobody lives on less than USD 2.15 a day which is the extreme poverty line, providing every child with a quality primary and secondary school education, achieving gend

UN to keep pushing for extension of food exports from Russia, Ukraine

Top UN officials have vowed to keep working for an extension of the deal that allows food and fertilizer exports from Russia and Ukraine despite their war, pushing back at Moscow's pessimism about a renewal before the July 17 expiration. UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres urged both countries to make global food security a priority and "help ensure that these products can reach global markets smoothly, efficiently and at scale", UN deputy spokesman Farhan Haq said on Friday. "Together, the agreements are contributing to sustained reductions in global food prices, which are now more than 23 per cent below the record highs reached in March last year." Turkey and the UN brokered a breakthrough accord with the warring sides last July, which has enabled Ukraine to ship over 32 million tonnes of grain from Black Sea ports to global markets. Moscow, however, complains that the separate UN-Russia memorandum on facilitating shipments of Russian food and fertiliser still faces serious ...

UN world food price index hit almost 2 years low at 122.3 points in June

The Food and Agriculture Organization's (FAO) price index, which tracks the most globally-traded food commodities, averaged 122.3 points in June

West clashes with Russia, Iran at UN over Tehran''s uranium enrichment

The United States and its Western allies clashed with Russia and Iran at the U.N. Security Council on Thursday over Tehran's advancing uranium enrichment and its reported supply of combat drones to Moscow being used to attack Ukraine. The sharp exchanges came at the council's semi-annual meeting on implementation of its resolution endorsing the 2015 nuclear deal between Iran and six major countries known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, which the U.S. under then-President Donald Trump left in 2018. At the start of the meeting, Russia's U.N. Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia accused Britain, which hold the council presidency, of seeking to hold an openly politicized show by inviting Ukraine to take part in the meeting when it is not part of the JCPOA. He demanded a procedural vote on its participation. U.S. deputy ambassador Robert Wood countered, accusing both Iran and Russia of participating in the transfer of drones used in Ukraine without prior Security Council approval in ..

IAEA chief Grossi nods to discord among Fukushima water report experts

Beijing has blasted the IAEA's report saying the body should not be endorsing a plan which poses risks to marine life and human health, despite assurances from Japan

India slams Pakistan for politically-motivated, venomous remarks in UNSC

India has slammed Pakistan for its "politically-motivated" and "venomous" remarks that referred to Jammu and Kashmir during a Security Council debate on children and armed conflict, saying those who are soaked in bigotry will find it hard to understand a pluralistic society. Counsellor in India's Permanent Mission to the UN Ashish Sharma's sharp response came at the UN Security Council open debate on Wednesday on Children and Armed Conflict, held under UK's presidency for the month, after Pakistan's UN envoy Munir Akram referred to Jammu and Kashmir in his statement. Akram said that it was an anomaly that the latest report of UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres on Children and Armed Conflict does not include India. "Let me also respond to the politically-motivated and frivolous remarks made by one delegation against my country. I will not dignify their venomous comments on India by responding to those, since those who are soaked in bigotry will find it hard to understand a ...

Millions left with no aid as West Africa suffers worst hunger crisis: UN

The UN World Food Programme said Wednesday that millions of hungry people in West Africa are without aid as the agency struggles with limited funding to respond to the region's worst hunger crisis in a decade. Nearly half of the 11.6 million people targeted for food aid during the June to August lean season are not receiving any assistance, the agency said in a statement. It warned that hundreds of thousands of people are at risk of joining armed groups, getting married early or engaging in survival sex in their desperation to survive. We're in a tragic situation. During this year's lean season, millions of families will lack sufficient food reserves to sustain them until the next harvests in September," said Margot Vandervelden, WFP interim regional director for Western Africa. "We must take immediate action to prevent a massive slide into catastrophic hunger, she said. Long before last year's flooding and Russia's war in Ukraine, West Africa already was facing its worst food cris

UN urges Security Council to extend Turkey border crossing into Syria

The UN secretary general is hoping that the Security Council will vote later this month to keep a key border crossing from Turkiye to Syria's rebel-held northwest open for critical aid deliveries for a period of one year instead of six months, a UN official said Tuesday. Syria's northwestern province of Idlib is home to some 4 million people, many of whom were earlier displaced during the 12-year civil war, which has killed nearly half a million people. Hundreds of thousands live in tent settlements and rely on aid that comes through the Bab al-Hawa border crossing. The Security Council is expected to vote in the coming days, as the current six-month opening period expires on July 10. The situation got worse after the February 6 earthquake that hit southern Turkiye and northern Syria, killing tens of thousands of people and leaving many more homeless and in need of aid. In the past, Russia, the main backer of Syrian President Bashar Assad, abstained on or vetoed resolutions on ...

No place for double standards on terrorism, says PM Modi at SCO summit

Says group can become an important voice for reforms in global institutions, such as the UN

UN nuclear chief in Japan to give report on release of radioactive water

The head of the UN nuclear agency is in Japan to meet with government leaders Tuesday and to see final preparations for the release of treated radioactive wastewater into the sea from the damaged Fukushima nuclear plant, on a visit Japan hopes will give credibility to the contentious plan. International Atomic Energy Agency head Rafael Mariano Grossi will meet with Prime Minister Fumio Kishida later Tuesday to submit IAEA's final report on the water release. All of IAEA's interim evaluations have been positive and the final report is expected to say that the water sampling, testing and monitoring plans involved in the release are adequate and fulfill international requirements. The treated radioactive water, stored in about 1,000 tanks that are nearing their 1.37 million ton capacity, must be removed to prevent accidental leaks and to make room for the plant's decommissioning. Japanese regulators finished their final safety inspection of the equipment last Friday and the plant ...

UN deputy secretary-general visits India to discuss various global issues

United Nations Deputy Secretary-General Amina J Mohammed on Monday began a three-day visit to India with an aim to discuss various global issues. It is her first visit to India since her reappointment to the post for a second five-year term in January last year. The UN deputy secretary-general (DSG) will hold separate meetings with External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, Environment Minister Bhupender Yadav and India's G20 Sherpa Amitabh Kant. "The DSG's visit to India will be an opportunity to exchange views on India's ongoing G20 presidency and its achievements in Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) ahead of the SDG summit in September this year, and issues related to climate action in context of developmental priorities," the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) said. It said the visit is a reflection of India's abiding commitment to multilateralism, including through its contribution to the UN and its ongoing G20 presidency, in addressing glo

Cash-strapped Pakistan explores external financing options after IMF deal

With the IMF now on board, the cash-strapped Pakistan government is now considering meeting most of its external financing needs in the medium term through 10-15 years of international bonds and concessional multilateral loans, according to a media report on Monday. It also plans to diversify local debt instruments to inflation-based bonds, list government papers on the stock exchange, and issue short-term Islamic and conventional floating rate products, the Dawn newspaper reported. The Pakistan government and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) last week reached a long-awaited staff-level agreement to inject USD 3 billion into the ailing economy after months-long negotiations that pushed the country to the brink of default. This is part of the new Medium-Term Debt Management Strategy, released by the Ministry of Finance on the weekend, for the fiscal years 2023 -2026, the report said. Availing maximum concessional external financing from bilateral and multilateral development ..

UN Child and Armed Conflict report: What it is and why India was removed?

This is the first time India has been removed from the list since 2010 due to cooperative measures taken by the nation with the UN to better protect children

UK calls for UN reform with permanent Security Council seat for India

The UK government has reiterated its call for reform of the United Nations as one of its top transnational priorities and supported India's bid for permanent membership of the powerful Security Council. India has been at the forefront of the years-long efforts to reform the UN Security Council (UNSC), saying it rightly deserved a place as a permanent member of the United Nations. Currently, the UNSC has five permanent members - China, France, Russia, the UK and the US. Only a permanent member has the power to veto any substantive resolution. In a speech at a conference at the Chatham House think tank in London on Thursday, UK Foreign Secretary James Cleverly called for a reinvigorated multilateral system that is more reflective of the times. He pointed out that the world's economic centre of gravity is shifting away from the Euro-Atlantic and towards the Indo-Pacific but the multilateral institutions are yet to catch up. I have five transnational priorities. First, reform of the .

UN nuke chief to visit Fukushima plant, see preps for release of wastewater

The chief of the UN nuclear agency will visit Japan next week to meet with Japanese leaders and see final preparations for the release of treated radioactive wastewater from the damaged Fukushima nuclear plant into the Pacific Ocean, officials said Friday. Japan's government hopes the visit by International Atomic Energy Agency head Rafael Mariano Grossi will add credibility to the discharge plan. It has been strongly opposed by local fishing groups and by neighboring South Korea, China and some Pacific Island nations over safety concerns. Grossi will visit Japan July 4-7, Foreign Minister Yoshimasa Hayashi said. He is expected to meet with Hayashi, Industry Minister Yasutoshi Nishimura and Prime Minister Fumio Kishida and visit the Fukushima plant, which was damaged by a massive earthquake and tsunami in 2011. Japan attaches great importance to the efforts of the IAEA, which serves an important role in promoting nuclear nonproliferation and peaceful uses of nuclear energy. We hope

India criticises delay in negotiations over UN Security Council reforms

As the UN General Assembly decided to roll over the Inter-Governmental Negotiations on Security Council reform to its next session, India has termed it as yet another wasted opportunity and said the process could well go on for another 75 years without achieving genuine progress. The UN General Assembly Thursday adopted a draft oral decision to continue the intergovernmental negotiations on Security Council reform at the 78th session of the UN General Assembly that will commence in September. The rollover decision marked the end of the IGN for the current 77th session. India's Permanent Representative at the UN Ambassador Ruchira Kamboj underscored that the roll-over decision of the IGN simply cannot be reduced to a mindless technical exercise. We see this technical rollover decision as yet another wasted opportunity to instil a breath of life into a process that has shown no signs of life or growth in over four decades, Kamboj said adding that India joined the consensus in the ...

Over 130,000 Afghan refugees will require re-settlement in Pakistan: UNHCR

In the 'Projected Global Resettlement Needs Assessment for 2024', UNHCR anticipates a 20 per cent increase in global refugee resettlement needs for the next year

UN telecom body ITU accepts India's inputs on 6G technology framework

UN body International Telecom Union has accepted India's inputs on the 6G technology framework, indicating the country's crucial role in the development of next-generation high-speed technology, an official statement said on Thursday. According to the ITU-APT Foundation of India (IAFI), the Indian administration has played a critical role in getting ubiquitous connectivity accepted as a key usage scenario. "India is emerging as a key player in the development of 6G technology. ITU has recently accepted India's contribution towards setting a global framework on 6G. It is Hon'ble PM Modi's clear vision that India must lead the world in 6G," Telecom Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw said in the statement. Modi released India's 6G Vision "Bharat 6G Vision" document in March 2023, envisaging India to be a front-line contributor in the design, development and deployment of 6G technology by 2030. The Department of Telecommunications worked on this ITU 6G framework with the involvement of major ..

UNESCO members expected to approve US entry in UN's cultural agency

UNESCO's 193 members states are gathering Thursday for a two-day meeting in Paris aimed at voting on the United States' plans to rejoin the U.N. cultural and scientific agency after a decade-long dispute sparked by the organization's move to include Palestine as a member. The U.S. announced earlier this month, that it wanted to return, five years after it withdrew from the agency during the presidency of Donald Trump. U.S. officials say the decision was motivated by concern that China is filling the gap left by the U.S. in UNESCO policymaking, notably in setting standards for artificial intelligence and technology education around the world. Approval by member states seems a formality since not a single country has raised an objection to the return of a country that was once the agency's single biggest funder. The vote is expected Thursday or Friday. The U.S. and Israel stopped financing UNESCO after it voted to include Palestine as a member state in 2011. The Trump administration

Made effort to remove India from UN report on children in armed clash: Govt

The government was consistently making efforts to exclude India from the UN's annual report on the impact of armed conflict on children, the Women and Child Development Ministry has said after the country did not feature in the report for the first time since 2010. The United Nations has removed India from its annual report on the impact of armed conflict on children, citing "measures taken by the government to better protect" them. In a statement, the Women and Child Development Ministry said, "The ongoing engagement of the Government of India with the Special Representative of the Secretary-General sped up after an inter-ministerial meeting in November 2021." The meeting was attended by Secretary of the Ministry of Women and Child Development Indevar Pandey, Ministry of External Affairs, Permanent Mission of India at New York, the Ministry of Home Affairs, and Virginia Gamba, the special representative of the Secretary-General for Children and the UN officials in New Delhi. The m