Over 200,000 people have fled the crisis in Sudan to seek refuge in Chad. United Nations Emergency Relief Coordinator Martin Griffiths has allocated $6 million from the Central Emergency Response Fund to host communities in eastern Chad who need food and livelihood support.
Disarmament
The issue of supplying weapons to Ukraine divided both those briefing the Security Council today and the discussion that followed, as contentions that arms transfers have escalated the conflict met assertions that the embattled country has the inherent right to defend itself from the Russian Federation’s full-scale invasion.
The Humanitarian Coordinator for the Occupied Palestinian Territory warned of the imminent risk of forced eviction in the old city of Jerusalem. According to the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, at least 970 Palestinians, including 424 children, are at risk of forced eviction in East Jerusalem.
Following the recently failed launch of what the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea has described as a military reconnaissance satellite, a senior United Nations official today stressed to the Security Council that diplomacy — and not isolation — is the only way forward, as she underlined that the 15-nation organ’s lack of unity and action does little to slow the Korean Peninsula’s negative trajectory.
The following statement was issued today by the Spokesman for UN Secretary-General António Guterres:
The United Nations Office for Disarmament Affairs and the Government of Japan are calling on young people to apply for an innovative learning programme that will empower them to make their contribution to a world free of nuclear weapons.
Preventing the diversion of arms transferred to Ukraine is essential for security and stability in that country and beyond, a senior United Nations disarmament official told the Security Council today, as members alternately called for dialogue over proliferation or underscored Ukraine’s right to defend itself from the permanent member that requested the meeting.
Following is the text of UN Secretary-General António Guterres’ video message to the fifth Session of the Review Conference of the States Parties to the Convention on the Prohibition of the Development, Production, Stockpiling and Use of Chemical Weapons and on their Destruction, in The Hague today:
All efforts by the Technical Secretariat of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) to organize the next round of consultations with Syria continue to be unsuccessful, the United Nations disarmament chief told the Security Council today, stressing the need for full cooperation by Damascus.
After three weeks of discussions, the Disarmament Commission concluded its 2023 substantive session today, with the approval by consensus of its draft report to the General Assembly, as well as the reports of its subsidiary bodies.