UN Insider

Photo: UN Secretary-General António Guterres (centre) visits Bucha, on the outskirts of the Ukrainian capital, Kyiv. UN Photo/Eskinder Debebe

UN Chief Guterres Visits Ukraine and Calls for Justice

By Radwan Jakeem with UN News

NEW YORK (IDN) — UN Secretary-General António Guterres was visibly "personally affected" on visiting sites of suspected war crimes in Ukraine on April 28, where he condemned the "evil" acts committed against civilians and urged criminal accountability.

His visit to the Kyiv suburbs of Borodianka, Bucha and Irpin took place nine weeks since the Russian invasion began on February 24. Mr Guterres urged Russia "to accept to cooperate" with the ongoing investigation launched by the International Criminal Court, the ICC.

: Radwan Jakeem; UN INSIDER; 01 May 2022

Photo: President Mokgweetsi Masisi of Botswana gives opening remarks at the ECOSOC Financing for Development Forum, 25 April 2022. Credit: UNDESA/Predrag Vasic

A New Integrated Financing Facility to Help Achieve UN’s Development Goals by 2030

By Thalif Deen

UNITED NATIONS (IDN) — The UN’s 17 Sustainable Development Goals, which primarily include the eradication of extreme poverty and hunger by 2030, are in deep financial trouble.

The goals have been severely undermined by the cumulative effects of several factors, including the economic fallout from the war in Ukraine and, most importantly, the widespread COVID-19 pandemic which has had a devastating impact on both the world’s rich and poor nations.

: Thalif Deen; SUSTAINABILITY; Poverty; 30 April 2022

A New Report Reveals the Economic Power of Africa’s Cities

By Jaya Ramachandaran

PARIS | ABIDJAN | ADDIS ABABA (IDN) — Urbanisation enhances gross domestic product (GDP), finds a new report by the Sahel and West Africa Club (SWAC/OECD) in partnership with the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) and the African Development Bank (AfDB).

Africa’s Development Dynamics 2022 The Economic Power of Africa’s Cities analyses data from four million individuals and firms in 2 600 cities across 34 African countries. It claims to offer the most extensive assessment of the impact of Africa’s cities on social and economic outcomes.

: Jaya Ramachandran; SUSTAINABILITY; Sustainable Cities & Communities; 29 April 2022

Photo: The Sun rises behind Long Island City skyscrapers at dawn of the first day of the general debate of the General Assembly's seventy-sixth session (2021). UN Photo/Mark Garten

Ukraine Proves UN Cannot Singlehandedly Usher in a Nuclear-Weapons-Free World

By Thalif Deen

UNITED NATIONS (IDN) — The devastating war in Ukraine—now moving towards the third month—has triggered several threats of the “nuclear option”.

The battle, which began with the Russian invasion of Ukraine on February 24, is between one of the world’s major nuclear powers and a neighboring non-nuclear country.

: Thalif Deen; ARMAMENTS; Nuclear Weapons; 27 April 2022

Photo Credit: Predrag Vasic/SPCS/OUSG/DESA

Urgent Need to Tackle Inequalities in Financing for Development Worsened by the COVID-19 Pandemic

By Jamshed Baruah

NEW YORK (IDN) — In the face of dramatic reversals in global progress towards achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), urgent action is required by the international community to improve developing countries’ access to affordable finance.

Inaugurating the four-day Forum on Financing for Development (FfD Forum) on April 25, ECOSOC President Mr. Collen V. Kelapile, Botswana's Permanent Representative to the UN said: “…The ambition of sustainable development for all is facing perhaps its greatest threat since the adoption of the 2030 Agenda seven years ago.”

: Jamshed Baruah; SUSTAINABILITY; Poverty; 26 April 2022

Image: Map of the Caribbean from CIA's The World Factbook

Caribbean Foreign Relations and Super-Power Politics of Putin’s Ukraine War

Viewpoint by P.I. Gomes

Dr P.I. Gomes is retired Ambassador of the Cooperative Republic of Guyana to the Kingdom of Belgium and the European Union and former Secretary-General of ACP Group of State, now the Organisation of African, the Caribbean and Pacific States (OACPS).

PORT OF SPAIN, Trinidad and Tobago (IDN) — Recent events of the Russia-Ukraine war bring in their wake untold upheavals across Europe.

: Dr. Patrick Gomes; SUSTAINABILITY; Peace & Justice; 23 April 2022

UN Condemns UK Plan to Dump Asylum-Seeking Refugees in Rwanda

By Lisa Vives, Global Information Network

NEW YORK (IDN) — The United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR) has joined other human rights groups in protesting plans by the United Kingdom to dump migrants and asylum-seekers who cross the Channel thousands of miles away to Rwanda as the government tries to cut the record numbers of people making the perilous journey.

: Global Information Network; UN INSIDER; 23 April 2022

Image credit: Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO)

Ukraine War Could Drive Millions Elsewhere into Starvation

By Kalinga Seneviratne

SYDNEY (IDN) — While images of the war devastation in Ukraine have saturated the news bulletins around the world, a much more severe human disaster is unravelling in many other parts of the world that could throw over one-fifth of humanity back into poverty.

“We have all seen the tragedy unfolding inside Ukraine: cities flattened; people suffering and dying in their homes and in the streets; the fastest displacement crisis in Europe since the Second World War," UN Secretary-General António Guterres pointed out in an address to the UN Security Council on April 5.

: Kalinga Seneviratne; SUSTAINABILITY; Poverty; 22 April 2022

Photo: An aid worker from the UN refugee agency attends to a baby at a UN-supported health center in the northern region of Burkina Faso. OCHA/Giles Clarke.

Private Sector Has a Pivotal Role in Achieving Universal Health Coverage in Low- and Middle-Income Countries

Viewpoint by Massimiliano Colella

The author is the chief executive officer of Evercare.

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (IDN) — With public debt reaching record highs both in developed and emerging markets—and with even more financial volatility following the COVID-19 pandemic—government budgets have been stretched thin. Underfunding in healthcare versus competing priorities has led to heavily burdened systems in emerging markets that are often struggling to keep up with increasing demands.

: Opinion Editor; SUSTAINABILITY; Health & Well Being; 22 April 2022

Photo: United Nations headquarters in New York, seen from the East River. CC BY 2.0

UN Opens its Doors to Visitors – After a long Pandemic Lockdown

By Rodney Reynolds

UNITED NATIONS, (IDN) — After more than two years of on-again, off-again pandemic lockdowns, the United Nations will soon return to normal—and re-open to the public.

The move comes amid reports of new infections from Covid-19, with mandatory masks still in force in New York city’s public transit systems, including buses and subways.