News headlines in February 2024, page 15

UN medics said on Wednesday that they feared a humanitarian disaster “beyond imagination” if a full-scale incursion by the Israeli military happens in Rafah in southern Gaza.

RIO DE JANEIRO, Feb 13 (IPS) - The World Social Forum (WSF) is today "more necessary than ever," according to Oded Grajew, promoter and co-founder of the global civil society meeting - a festival of diversity that has not yet succeeded in fomenting or designing the "other possible world" that it predicted when it was created and adopted that motto.

KATHMANDU, Feb 13 (IPS) - Najboon Khatun looks up at the sky every day, searching for the possibility of rain. Clouds come and go without a drop of water. “Winter crops like wheat and vegetables need water, but like last year, there has been no rainfall yet,” says 65-year-old Khatun, expressing her anguish.

WASHINGTON DC, Feb 13 (IPS) - In the early 1970s, conflict in the Middle East set off a spike in oil prices that left central banks around the world scrambling to control inflation. After a year or so, oil prices stabilized and inflation started to retreat. Many countries believed they had restored price stability and loosened policy to revive their recession-hit economies only to see inflation return. Could history repeat?

UN Humanitarian Affairs Coordinator Martin Griffith has reiterated his warning against a full-scale military assault on Rafah, where more than half of Gaza’s population is now sheltered.

As the world celebrates World Radio Daymarked on 13 February, we dug into the UN archives for a vintage podcast classic from 1959, when famed Frankenstein actor Boris Karloff narrated an episode describing a visit to a leprosy clinic in Tiranka, Nigeria.

Civilians continue to bear the brunt as the war between rival militaries in Sudan spreads into new areas, driving displacement and hunger while exposing communities to deadly diseases, UN humanitarians warned on Tuesday.

Countries must act now to break the deadly links between conflict, climate and food insecurity, UN Secretary-General António Guterres said on Tuesday, addressing a Security Council meeting focused on these challenges.

Sharing borders with Gaza, Israel, Libya and Sudan, Egypt has taken a lead role in providing lifesaving aid in the region. Since the outbreak of conflict in Sudan last April and the ongoing war in Gaza, both the Government and the Egyptian Red Crescent Society have been key actors in helping to assist millions of civilians caught in the crossfire.

As international efforts continue to secure a ceasefire in Gaza, the head of UNRWA, the UN aid agency for Palestinians, warned on Tuesday that those in the enclave remain deeply traumatised by the war with Israel and afraid of a full-scale assault on Rafah in the south.