Category: UN INSIDER

By Rita Joshi

BONN (IDN) – While a new UN report finds that health risks related to climate change are on the rise worldwide, it avers that coordinated international responses can help prevent some of the worst impacts of climate change on health.

“The report clearly highlights the need for the UN and partners to continuously strengthen their actions to support governments to build climate resilience, including measures to protect human health,” says Youssef Nassef, Director of the Adaptation Programme of the UNFCCC secretariat.

The report, which will be presented to governments during the next round of climate change negotiations to be held in Bonn from May 8-18, 2017, was prepared in collaboration with countries, the World Health Organization and other relevant expert organisations, under the Nairobi work programme − UN Knowledge-for-Action Climate Resilience Network.

By Jaya Ramachandran

This report is based on an unofficial record of the Economic and Social Council 2017 Session, Partnership Forum (ECOSOC/6821) on April 5, 2017. – The Editor.

NEW YORK (IDN) – “The clock is ticking and we have no time to waste” amid climate change, rapid urbanization, mass movements of people and other global trends affecting communities and financing worldwide, said Amina Mohammed, Deputy Secretary-General of the United Nations in a video message to the day-long Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) Partnership Forum on April 5.

The 2030 Agenda had set the bar high and partnerships were key to supporting the Sustainable Development Goals and ensuring their success. In fostering partnerships, critical elements included delivering results on the ground, providing effective financing and garnering significant private-sector investment, the Deputy Secretary-General added.

By Santo D. Benerjee

NEW YORK (IDN) – A new report has expressed dissatisfaction with the current pace of progress on three global energy goals – access to electricity, renewable energy and efficiency, and stressed that more action is needed to meet energy targets by 2030 as envisaged in the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

According to the latest Global Tracking Framework (GTF) report, released on April 3 by the World Bank and the International Energy Agency as part of the Sustainable Energy for All Knowledge Hub, the increase of people getting access to electricity is slowing down.

By Devendra Kamarajan

NEW YORK (IDN) – Energy drives and enables national development and the global economy. Energy lies at the heart of the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), which constitute Agenda 2030 endorsed by world leaders at the United Nations Summit in September 2015.

It is widely agreed that increasing renewable energy production and consumption by 2030 will therefore contribute to climate change resilience, economic growth and poverty reduction. 

Kazakhstan, as a forward looking and staunch proponent of energy security for over half a decade now, will contribute to global discourse and multilateral action by hosting the international specialized exhibition EXPO-2017 on Future Energy from June 10 to September 10 in the country’s capital Astana.

By Jaya Ramachandran

BERLIN | VIENNA (IDN) – With the Somali pirates back after a lull of five years, the United Nations and the European Union anti-piracy taskforce (EU Naval Force) are urging greater vigilance and asking ships to continue to follow the advice of navies and the International Maritime Organization (IMO) when planning passage off Somalia.

The UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) Executive Director Yury Fedotov said: “After . . . attacks, following a lull of five years, it is clear that Somali pirates are resurgent and intent on continuing attacks on commercial shipping. I urge the international community to be vigilant, to work in close partnership and to hold the Somali pirates accountable.” Fedotov was speaking after a spate of recent piracy attacks off Somalia.

By J Nastranis

NEW YORK (IDN) – Prohibiting the financing of nuclear weapons production was one of the issues discussed at the first session of the UN conference to negotiate a nuclear weapons prohibition treaty from March 27 to 31 at the world body’s headquarters in New York. 

The proposal has its origins in a working paper submitted by the Dutch peacebuilding NGO PAX to the Open Ended Working Group (OEWG) in 2016: Closing our wallets to nuclear weapons: the necessity of including explicit language on financing in a nuclear weapons prohibition treaty or framework of agreements. This led to the inclusion of this concept in the final document of the OEWG, which includes explicit language raised in the working paper.  

By Jutta Wolf

BERLIN (IDN) – While warning UN Secretary-General António Guterres of a growing lack of trust in the Security Council throughout the Middle East and North Africa (MENA), a group of Women Civil Society Organisations has proposed far-reaching measures “to advance women’s rights and set the UN back on track as an Organization that works for the common interests of our shared humanity.”

In an open letter, Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom (WILPF) and 25 MENA Women Civil Society Organisations state that popular feeling in the Middle East and North Africa “is one characterised by a lack of faith in the United Nations’ ability to implement its mandate in line with the principles of the Charter.”

By Ramesh Jaura

BERLIN | NEW YORK (IDN) – Both Japan and Kazakhstan have suffered from nuclear weapons: Japan through the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945 and Kazakhstan through the fallout from 456 nuclear test explosions conducted at the Semipalatinsk, the former Soviet nuclear test site near what is now the village of Semey.

The two countries are therefore committed to realizing a world free of nuclear weapons – for example through entry into force of the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT) – and consider it a main goal of humanity in the 21st century. This was reaffirmed during the first session of the UN conference to negotiate a nuclear weapons prohibition treaty, from March 27 to 31 at the UN headquarters in New York. The second session is scheduled for June 15 through July 7.

By Rodney Reynolds

NEW YORK (IDN) – Despite an organized boycott by over 40 countries, including four major nuclear powers, a UN conference aimed at negotiating an international treaty to ban nuclear weapons made a significant breakthrough in its first-ever attempt at a legally-binding instrument to eliminate one of the world’s deadliest weapons of mass destruction (WMDs).

Even without the participation of nuclear states, the ban treaty will have a powerful impact, predicted the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN). “Treaties often change the behavior of non-party States, including the ban on WMDs and Law of the Sea”.