Nigeria

The Secretary-General has issued terms of reference for an impartial, independent mechanism to help investigate and prosecute those responsible for the most serious crimes committed in Syria since March 2011.

In a video message to the opening of the 2017 session of the Conference on Disarmament, the Secretary-General described disarmament as an integral element of a peaceful and prosperous world, spotlighting its potentially important role in ending existing conflicts and preventing the outbreak of new strife.

Three months after Hurricane Matthew made landfall in Haiti, the World Food Programme (WFP) says that the number of people facing hunger and food insecurity in the country’s most affected areas has declined steadily — from approximately 1 million to 400,000.

United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi expressed shock today at yesterday’s bombing of a site for internally displaced people in north-east Nigeria that left dozens of people dead.  A United Nations Humanitarian Air Service helicopter airlifted eight injured Nigeria Red Cross workers.

This morning the Under-Secretary-General for Peacekeeping Operations briefed the Security Council on Darfur.  Although there been a decrease in armed conflict in Darfur, he said, civilians had remained exposed to significant sources of insecurity such as intercommunal conflict and criminality.

The following statement was issued today by the Spokesperson for UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon: