News headlines in 2020, page 59

NEW DELHI, Jun 30 (IPS) - Being the sole candidate from the Asia Pacific region for the non-permanent seat of the United Nations Security Council (UNSC), India was elected by 184 votes in the 193-member United Nations' General Assembly on June 17, 2020.

SYDNEY and KUALA LUMPUR, Jun 30 (IPS) - Seventy-five years ago, on 26 June 1945, before the Japanese surrender ending the Second World War, fifty nations gathered at San Francisco's Opera House to sign the United Nations (UN) Charter.

Jun 29 (IPS) - While COVID-19 has made the headlines every day over the past two months, services for tuberculosis (TB), one of the oldest diseases in the world, have been interrupted due to the lockdown. According to the World Health Organization's (WHO) Global Tuberculosis Report 2019India had an estimated 2.7 million new cases and 440,000 deaths due to TB in 2018—the highest in the world.

WASHINGTON DC, Jun 29 (IPS) - Cast your mind back. Six months ago—it seems like a lifetime—the world's attention was on Madrid. The United Nations was meeting to take stock of international progress in fighting climate change. Headlines were dominated by young people pointing out—rightly—that governments were still not doing enough. They demanded urgent and ambitious action to cut emissions and help the most vulnerable.

Jun 29 (IPS) - Warnings at the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic that Africa could be hit by a wave of up to 10 million cases within six months thankfully now seem unfounded, although it is still far too early to be over-confident.

NAIROBI, Jun 29 (IPS) - Pauline Akwacha's popular chain of eateries, famously known as Kakwacha Hangover Hotels and situated at the heart of Kisumu City's lakeside in Kenya, is facing its most daunting challenge yet. As Akwacha and other women in business across this East African nation brace themselves for the post-COVID-19 economy. 

AYACUCHO, Peru, Jun 29 (IPS) - A communally built small dam at almost 3,500 meters above sea level supplies water to small-scale farmer Cristina Azpur and her two young daughters in Peru's Andes highlands, where they face water shortages exacerbated by climate change.

LONDON, Jun 29 (IPS) - Global upheaval caused by the COVID-19 pandemic has left society's most vulnerable exposed. Instances of child sexual exploitation material (CSEM) found online have increased at an alarming rate over past months.

KHARTOUM, Jun 26 (IPS) - This week, when Sudan's Minister of Energy and Mining Adil Ibrahim addressed the country, stating that households will face power-cuts for up to seven hours a day, people had already been sitting on plastic chairs outside their homes, scouring the internet to purchase battery-operated fans. This Northeast African nation has seen temperature highs of up to 41 degrees Celsius recently.

UNITED NATIONS, Jun 26 (IPS) - The current pandemic is not only heightening mental health concerns, but might also put many at risk of becoming institutionalised or being neglected by the system.