Youth-Led Initiative Focuses on Protecting Human Rights By J Nastranis NEW YORK, 29 March 2023 (IDN) — The UN General Assembly has adopted a landmark resolution requesting the International Court of Justice to render an Advisory Opinion on the obligations of States in respect of climate change. Pacific Island Students Fighting Climate Change initiated the […]
UN Constrained to Focus on Consequences of Climate Change
By René Wadlow, President, Association of World Citizens GENEVA, 28 March 2023 (IDN) — On 20 March 2023, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) published a Synthesis Report based on its three previous reports covering eight years of work. The IPCC is a panel of 93 scientists co-chaired by Hoesung Lee of South Korea […]
China’s Peacemaker Role Stymied In Ukraine, But Makes Headway Elsewhere
By Arul Louis The writer is a New York-based non-resident senior fellow of the Society for Policy Studies, a New Delhi-based think tank. He can be contacted @arulouis. UNITED NATIONS, 27 March 2023 (IDN) — Chinese President Xi Jinping is auditioning for the role of a global statesman through diplomatic efforts to mediate in several […]
Our Global Water Crisis — A Few Facts
By John Scales Avery* COPENHAGEN, 24 March 2023 (IDN) — On its home page on World Water Day, 2021, the United Nations pointed out the following facts: Today, 1 in 3 people live without safe drinking water. By 2050, up to 5.7 billion people could be living in areas where water is scarce for at […]
Twenty Years Ago in Iraq, Ignoring Weapons Inspectors Proved to Be a Fatal Mistake
By Robert E. Kelley The writer is Distinguished Associate Fellow at the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI). “Let me begin by saying, we were almost all wrong, and I certainly include myself here.”—David Kay, Head of the Iraq Survey Group, during testimony to the US Senate on 29 January 2004.
Water, Water Everywhere But is it Fit to Drink?
By Thalif Deen UNITED NATIONS, 22 March 2023 (IDN) — A much-quoted line in Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s lyrical ballad, ‘The Rime of the Ancient Mariner’, reads: “’water, water everywhere—nor any drop to drink’. The poem goes back to the year 1798—and more than five centuries later, the cry for water, described as a basic human […]
Kazakhstan Observes Three Decades of Cooperation With UN
By Saniya Sakenova ASTANA, 14 March 2023 (IDN | The Astana Times) — Over the past 30 years, Kazakhstan has built up a productive cooperation with the United Nations, being a coherent advocate and active promoter of its ideals and goals, First Deputy Foreign Minister Kairat Umarov said at a March 10 event marking the […]
Yemen, Facing World’s Worst Humanitarian Disaster, Misses Aid Target
By Thalif Deen UNITED NATIONS, 27 February 2023 (IDN) — The United Nations once described the deaths and destruction in the eight-year-old civil war in Yemen as “the world’s worst humanitarian disaster”. The killings of mostly civilians have been estimated at over 100,000, with accusations of war crimes against a coalition led by Saudi Arabia […]
Present-day UN Apparently Incapable of Ending the Ukraine War
By J Nastranis NEW YORK, 25 Feb 2023 (IDN) — As the Ukraine War triggered by the Russian invasion enters the second year, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s call on United Nations Security Council to act for peace, or ‘dissolve’ itself has acquired new relevance. In an impassioned address to the Security Council on 5 April […]
As Russian Invasion Enters its Second Year, the UN Remains Paralysed
By Arul Louis The writer is a New York-based non-resident senior fellow of the Society for Policy Studies, a New Delhi-based think tank. He can be contacted @arulouis. UNITED NATIONS, 20 Feb 2023 (IDN) — Paralysed by its own Charter and structure, the world organisation that is charged with preventing wars confronts an existential challenge […]