Burkina Faso

A new United Nations Children’s Fund report shows that 320,000 children and young people under the age of 20 were infected with HIV in 2019 – about one every 100 seconds, bringing the total number of children living with HIV to 2.8 million.  About half of children worldwide had access to life-saving treatment; nearly 100,000 children died of AIDS.

The following statement was issued by the Spokesman for UN Secretary-General António Guterres:

There has been a dramatic rise in major storms, drought, wildfires, floods and other extreme weather events over the last 20 years, which have claimed 1.23 million lives, impacted 4.2 billion people and caused almost $3 trillion in global economic losses, according to a report published today by the United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction.

The Nobel Committee has awarded this year’s Peace Prize to the United Nation World Food Programme (WFP).  The Secretary-General congratulates David Beasley, WFP’s Executive Director, as well as the agency’s entire staff.  The Programme is on the frontlines of food insecurity, serving the most vulnerable of the world.

The Human Rights Council held an urgent debate on conditions in Belarus, with the High Commissioner for Human Rights, in a statement, noting the continuation of mass demonstrations and expressing alarm over hundreds of claims of torture and ill treatment while in police custody.  She urged authorities to facilitate independent, prompt and impartial investigations.

A survey by the United Nations Children’s Fund found that 535,500 children in Burkina Faso under five years old are acutely malnourished, including 156,000 who suffer from severe acute malnutrition and are at imminent risk of death.  Community health workers have been mobilized to screen and treat children in the most remote areas.

In Mali, human rights officials from the United Nations peacekeeping mission have gained access to President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita and other detainees held by the mutineers since Tuesday.  The Mission continues to closely monitor the situation and reports that Bamako remains relatively calm with no major security incidents.

The Beirut port is temporarily operational, with nearly 9,000 containers unloaded between 11 and 18 August, including 1,000 tons of goods such as iron and wheat.  The High Commissioner for Refugees is providing psychosocial support, emergency help cash and shelter kits, one of several United Nations agencies to offer emergency assistance.

There is a real danger that the global health crisis will create a COVID-19 generation who lose out on schooling and see their opportunities permanently damaged, warned Gordon Brown, Special Envoy on Global Education, noting that an estimated 30 million children may never return to school, according to UNESCO.

Exceptional and prolonged heat in Siberia has fuelled devastating Arctic fires, the World Meteorological Organization said today, noting that temperatures in Siberia again topped 30°C this week.  The heat will influence weather and climate in lower latitudes, where hundreds of millions of people live, it warned.