News headlines in January 2023, page 10

The UN deputy chief and head of UN Women have conveyed a direct message to Afghanistan’s Taliban leadership calling on them to put the good of the country first and end recent policies towards women and girls that have confined them in their own homes, and violated their basic human rights.

China is “making enormous progress and effort” to get every older adult vaccinated against COVID-19, the UN health agency said on Friday, while also cautioning that it will take time to protect everyone.

Cambodia is poised to make strides towards the full social integration of gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people, protecting them from violence and discrimination, a UN-appointed independent human rights experts said on Friday.

The ongoing collapse of the rule of law and judicial independence in Afghanistan is “a human rights catastrophe”, UN-appointed independent human rights experts warned on Friday.

An innovative project seeking to develop climate resilience, self-sufficiency and the empowerment of vulnerable rural communities in southern Madagascar, could offer a game-changing template for future humanitarian work, the UN World Food Programme (WFP) said on Friday.

The first UN aid convoy to reach the vicinity of the battered eastern Ukrainian city of Soledar, since the Russian invasion began nearly a year ago, arrived on Friday morning, providing support for more than 800 civilians in need.

NABARNIZ, Spain, Jan 19 (IPS) - It's 23 hours a day in a cell without natural light and just one to walk around in a 7x4-metre courtyard. For Pablo González, an independent Spanish-Russian journalist, it's been almost a year spent in solitary confinement in Poland.

NAIROBI, Kenya, Jan 19 (IPS) - United States Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen is traveling to South Africa, Zambia, and Senegal this week in the hopes of strengthening U.S.-Africa relations at a time of waning U.S. influence on the continent — the first in a series of Biden administration trips announced at last month’s U.S.-Africa Leaders Summit.

KARNATAKA, INDIA, Jan 19 (IPS) - The South Indian State of Karnataka has been reeling for the past three years—the late arrival of monsoons, the surging temperatures, and drastic changes in the weather patterns are putting the state’s farmers in dire straits.

Some two million people in Lebanon, including 1.29 million Lebanese residents and 700,000 Syrian refugees, are suffering some form of food insecurity as a result of the multiple crises afflicting the country, with the situation expected to get worse in the months ahead, UN agencies said on Thursday.