News headlines in December 2022, page 2

Despite strong evidence that human activity played a role in catastrophic weather events, and the emergence of a fuel crisis sparked by the war in Ukraine, greenhouse gas emissions continued to rise. Nevertheless, the UN kept the climate emergency high on the international agenda, reaching major agreements on financing and biodiversity.

As temperatures across Ukraine have plummeted below zero and are expected to drop even more, the UN migration agency is stepping up efforts to help displaced and war-affected people cope with the cold weather.

Following four successive failed rainy seasons, Kenya is amid the worst drought in 40 years, the UN’s women’s health agency, UNFPA, said on Tuesday, shining a light on 134,000 pregnant or breastfeeding women who are reported to be acutely malnourished and in need of treatment.

Three years ago this month, the virus that causes COVID-19 was first detected, the UN chief reminded on Tuesday, the International Day of Epidemic Preparedness.

Indonesian fishing crews and local authorities who took part in rescuing more than 200 people adrift at sea, were hailed on Tuesday by the UN refugee agency, UNHCR, for their “act of humanity”. 

The UN rights chief, Volker Türk, called on Tuesday for the Taliban de facto authorities to revoke immediately a raft of policies that target the rights of women and girls in Afghanistan, saying that they cause “terrible, cascading effects” on their lives and risk destabilizing the nation.  

The UN warned that the COVID-19 pandemic is still a cause for global concern, and outbreaks of cholera, Ebola and Monkeypox (now renamed mpox) led to the mobilization of health and aid workers to contain life-threatening illnesses. The UN warned that the aim of eradicating HIV/AIDS by 2030 was under threat, but a new vaccine raised hopes that malaria can be beaten.

The UN Secretary-General, António Guterres, has expressed his confidence in Barbara Manzi, the most senior UN official in Burkina Faso, who was ordered to leave the country by the government on Friday.

A hundred million people were forced to leave their homes in 2022. The UN continued to help those in need in a myriad of ways, and push for more legal, and safe ways for people to migrate.

Amid reports on Saturday that the Taliban had barred women from working for local and international NGOs, the United Nations said the decision would undermine the efforts of numerous organizations working throughout Afghanistan to help the most vulnerable, especially women and girls.