Mali

Jayathma Wickramanayake, the Secretary-General’s Envoy on Youth, and The Body Shop, launched a campaign today that seeks to get young voices into the halls of power.  The campaign, “Be Seen, Be Heard”, seeks to create long-term structural changes that will make decision-making more inclusive of young people and ensure their participation in political life.

The United Nations Environment Programme today released a report saying sand, the world’s second most exploited resource, must be recognized as a strategic resource and its extraction from rivers and marine ecosystems and its use must rethought, as they can cause erosion and threaten livelihoods.  

The United Nations Mission in South Sudan (UNMISS) today strongly condemned the widespread sexual violence, as well as killings of civilians, and attacks on aid workers in Leer County.  UNMISS has carried out 10 verification missions and says that 72 civilians were killed, and 64 cases of sexual violence have been recorded.

Over 1 million children in Ghana, Kenya and Malawi have received one or more doses of the world’s first malaria vaccine thanks to a pilot programme coordinated by the World Health Organization.  The agency estimates that, if widely deployed, the vaccine could save the lives of an additional 40,000 to 80,000 children annually.

United Nations staff in South Africa say they are working closely with national and local authorities to support regions impacted by last week’s devastating floods, including providing dignity packs, blankets, food and other necessities in Kwazulu-Natal and Eastern Cape Provinces, and working to restore access to services and Internet connectivity.

The World Food Programme (WFP) says its operational costs for West Africa are expected to expand by $136 million as a result of rising fuel and food prices.  Some 43 million people are expected to face acute food insecurity by June.  Before the Ukraine conflict WFP had already forced to cut rations in Nigeria, Central African Republic, Chad, Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Mali and Niger.

United Nations humanitarian officials say an estimated 7.7 million people in South Sudan — that is about 63 per cent of the population — are likely to face crisis or worse levels of food insecurity through July, according to the latest food security analysis.  In 2021, 5.3 million people received food, health, water and sanitation, nutrition assistance and other critical services.

The United Nations takes note of the decision by Yemen’s President Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi to irrevocably delegate his full powers to a newly formed Presidential Leadership Council and stands ready to work with that Council and the Yemeni parties for a sustainable, inclusive settlement of the conflict.

A year and half after the military took power by force in Mali, there has been “no notable progress” in implementing the 2015 peace agreement, the top United Nations official in the country told the Security Council today, as delegates called for an independent investigation into reports of summary executions of civilians in the town of Moura in March.

The United Nations Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission in Mali (MINUSMA) has launched an investigation following reports that civilians were killed during clashes last week between the national armed forces and militants in Mourrah, about 400 kilometres north-east of Bamako, the capital.