Public information

The UN team in Costa Rica is presenting a “Preparedness and Response Plan for People in Transit” to partners this week, which aims to boost assistance to vulnerable refugees and migrants. Over 500,000 people entered Costa Rica from Panama in 2023 — more than double the number of those who did so in 2022.

The United Nations Department of Global Communications today announced the selection of Carole Osero-Ageng’o, Global Initiatives Lead and Africa Regional Representative at HelpAge International, and Nudhara Yusuf, Executive Coordinator for Global Governance Innovation Network at The Stimson Center, as Co-Chairs of the 2024 United Nations Civil Society Conference in Support of the Summit of the Future. The conference will take place on 9 and 10 May 2024, at the United Nations Office at Nairob, Kenya.

In Haiti, the Humanitarian Coordinator there condemned the violence that has further escalated in the capital, Port-au-Prince, as well as across the country. She said that civilians — particularly children — are bearing the brunt of the recent violence.

The Commissioner General of United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) reports that makeshift structures of plastic sheeting have mushroomed everywhere around Rafah, in the Gaza Strip, as people are displaced by the hostilities.

United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres has appointed Hiroyuki Saito of Japan as Director of the United Nations Information Centre in Dakar. He assumed his new duties on 12 January 2024.

The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) said today that 65 journalists have been killed in the line of duty in 2023, compared with 88 in 2022. The Head of UNESCO said that this drop conceals an alarming phenomenon: an increase in the number killed in conflict zones and more is online.

The United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) today released its annual Adaptation Gap Report, which finds that progress on climate adaptation is slowing on all fronts. The adaptation finance needs of developing countries are 10 to 18 times as big as international public finance flows.

Following is UN Secretary-General António Guterres’ message on the International Day to End Impunity for Crimes against Journalists, observed on 2 November:

Following is the text of UN Secretary-General António Guterres’ video message to the Internet Governance Forum, in Kyoto today:

The World Food Programme (WFP) has begun rolling out food distributions to nearly 900,000 refugees in Ethiopia following a full revamp of the safeguards and controls at its refugee operations, with refugee camps across five regions receiving food parcels for the first time since WFP paused food distributions in June.