News headlines in February 2022, page 3

Even before the recent events that “convulsed the world” last week, the UN Emergency Relief Coordinator reminded that an eight-year-long conflict in Eastern Ukraine had already level three million people in need of humanitarian assistance “on both sides of the contact line”.

A UN project, in association with one of India’s leading clean energy companies, is training women salt farmers in the Indian state of Gujarat to work in the solar power industry, and build a better life.

Russia vetoed a UN Security Council resolution on Friday that would have demanded that Moscow immediately stop its aggression against Ukraine and withdraw all troops, a move several Council members said was deplorable, but inevitable.

Perpetrators responsible for recent escalating violence in Unity state, South Sudan, must be held accountable, the UN Mission in the country, UNMISS, said in a statement on Friday. 

Sri Lanka has taken steps towards legal, institutional and security sector reforms, but more action is still needed, according to a report issued on Friday by the UN human rights office, OHCHR, which examines developments over the past year. 

As the Syrian war has driven poverty and hunger to levels higher than at any previous point, UN Special Envoy Geir Pedersen told the Security Council on Friday that he would continue to focus on engaging the parties to bring an end to the protracted conflict. 

The President of the UN General Assembly appealed on Friday for greater global solidarity to vaccinate the entire world against COVID-19.  

The impact of extreme weather on Madagascar is an example of the “runaway humanitarian needs” the world will face, unless it takes action to tackle the climate crisis, the World Food Programme (WFP) said on Friday.

LONDON, Feb 25 (IPS) - It is now clear diplomacy matters little to Vladimir Putin. Despite the efforts of a string of presidents and prime ministers to prevent conflict, on 24 February, Putin started the war he’d been itching for.

UNITED NATIONS, Feb 25 (IPS) - As a new political twist to an old saying goes: the dogs bark but the military caravan moves on.

Despite ominous warnings from an overwhelming majority of member states both in the General Assembly and the Security Council — against a military attack on Ukraine — Russian President Vladimir Putin stood defiant when he ordered a full-scale invasion of a sovereign territory.