By Caroline Mwanga NEW YORK (IDN) – While significant progress in eliminating the practice has been made in the last 30 years, approximately 200 million girls and women alive today have had their genitals mutilated. This can lead to long-term physical, psychological and social consequences, warns a joint statement by UN Women, UNFPA, UNICEF and […]
WHO Initiates a Two-Pronged Move to Combat Coronavirus
By Jaya Ramachandran GENEVA (IDN) – Two important steps have been taken to combat further spread of the new coronavirus (2019-nCoV) outbreak in China and globally. On the one hand, the international community has launched a US$675 million preparedness and response plan covering the months of February through to April 2020. On the other, the […]
UN Avails of Famed Literature Festival to Achieve Global Goals
By Devinder Kumar JAPIPUR (IDN) – As part of a Decade of Action for accelerating sustainable solutions to all the world’s biggest challenges — ranging from poverty and gender to climate change, inequality and closing the finance gap – the United Nations availed of a new tool end of January: the world’s largest literature festival […]
Politics-Big Money Nexus Feeds Corruption
By Sean Buchanan LONDON (IDN) – In the last year, anti-corruption movements across the globe have gained momentum as millions of people joined together to speak out against corruption in their governments. Protests from Latin America, North Africa and Eastern Europe to the Middle East and Central Asia made headlines as citizens marched in Santiago, […]
Trade Wars Threaten Food Security to the Detriment of the Poor
Viewpoint by Dr. Mukhisa Kituyi, UNCTAD Secretary-General GENEVA (IDN) – International trade has proven to be a critical mechanism for growth and development. It helps build stronger value chains, mitigate conflict and provides access to higher quality and quantities of goods and services. It has also provided consumers with access to a more diversified and […]
Sino-EU Duo Is Crucial to Driving the Global Climate Ambition
Viewpoint by Adam Tooze* NEW YORK (IDN) – There are turning points in history. Moments that matter, that mark beginnings and ends. As Martin Luther King reminded us: “There is such a thing as being too late”. It is that which can give politics its fierce urgency. As far as global climate politics is concerned, […]
UN Court Censures Myanmar for Violating Genocide Convention
Viewpoint by Rene Wadlow, President, Association of World Citizens GENEVA (IDN) – On January 23, 2020, a panel of 17 judges of the World Court (ICJ) voted unanimously calling on Myanmar (formerly Burma) to take all measures in its power to prevent genocide of the remaining 600,000 Rohingya that the Court stated were extremely vulnerable […]
High Levels of Inequality Can Escalate Political Instability
By Santo D. Banerjee NEW YORK (IDN) – As the United Nations prepares to mark its 75th anniversary in September, the Organisation has yet to fulfil the obligation enshrined in the mandate of the Charter: “to promote social progress and better standards of life in larger freedom“ by employing “international machinery for the promotion of […]
Urgent Health Challenges Facing the World
By Sean Buchanan GENEVA (IDN) – A list of urgent, global health challenges released by the World Health Organisation (WHO) at the beginning of 2020 reflects deep concern that leaders are failing to invest sufficient resources in core health priorities and systems. This, says the Geneva-based UN agency, is putting lives, livelihoods and economies in […]
The World’s Poorest Need Bold Actions by the Better Off
By Jamshed Baruah GENEVA (IDN) – As the United Nations launches an ambitious global effort to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by 2030, the fate of the world’s 47 most impoverished nations – the Least Developed Countries (LDCs) – has assumed added importance. UNCTAD, an organization of the UN, is therefore urging them to […]