Emergency Relief Coordinator Martin Griffiths today announced an extra $25 million grant to boost aid efforts and address urgent needs of hundreds of thousands of people in the earthquake-stricken parts of Syria. Some 130 search and rescue teams are working in affected areas in Türkiye; another 57 teams are on their way.
Noon Briefings
The World Health Organization (WHO) said today that Africa is witnessing an exponential rise in cholera cases amid a global surge. They note that cases recorded on the continent in the first month of 2023 alone have already risen by more than 30 per cent of the total caseload that we witnessed in 2022.
According to a new report by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) and the World Food Programme (WFP), one in three schools in the world still lack access to drinking water and basic sanitation facilities.
The United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) today released a report which says that to reduce superbugs, the world must cut down on pollution created by the pharmaceutical, agricultural and health-care sectors.
United Nations officials in Iraq condemned the abhorrent killing of 22-year-old Tiba al-Ali, whose death is a regretful reminder of the violence and injustice that still exists against women and girls in the country today.
The Food and Agriculture Organization, in its January Food Price Index, said that world food commodity prices declined for the tenth consecutive month and that low domestic prices could result in a small cutback in the Russian Federation’s wheat plantings while Ukraine’s winter wheat area plantings could reduce by about 40 per cent.
The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) today released a regional refugee and resilience plan, which is seeking $5.7 billion to reach 6.8 million Syrian refugees and 6.1 million people in host communities with assistance in 2023.
In the Central African Republic, the United Nations peacekeeping mission there began an electoral awareness campaign in Obo and in Bria to encourage strong participation in the local elections.
The UN refugee agency (UNHCR), together with 41 international and national partners, launched today the 2023 funding appeal for over $500 million to provide life-saving assistance to more than 900,000 refugees in Sudan, the second-largest asylum country in Africa.
According to the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), at least 2.6 million children in Haiti are expected to need life-saving assistance in 2023. In the past two years, the number of Haitian children in need of humanitarian aid has increased by half a million.