South Africa

The new Permanent Representative of South Africa to the United Nations, Mxolisi Sizo Nkosi, presented his credentials to UN Secretary-General António Guterres today.

A United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) analysis finds that Afghanistan risks losing up to 20,000 women teachers and 5,400 healthcare workers by 2030 as restrictions on girls’ education and women’s employment continue. Such restrictions are already costing $84 million annually in lost economic output.

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

In Abyei, leaders from the Ngok Dinka and Misseriya communities have signed a Declaration of Intent with the UN Interim Security Force for Abyei (UNISFA) to curb the spread of weapons in the disputed region between Sudan and South Sudan. UNISFA stresses that dialogue remains the only viable path to end disputes.

The United Nations Secretary-General, António Guterres, arrived in Johannesburg, South Africa, early in the afternoon on Friday, 21 November, to attend the annual Group of 20 (G20) meeting.

The Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs warns that a complete collapse of Internet and data services is paralysing aid operations across Gaza. This is reportedly not a routine outage — but a total failure of Gaza’s digital infrastructure — and most agencies are largely cut off from teams on the ground.

In South Sudan, the head of the United Nations Mission in South Sudan (UNMISS) continues to be engaged in intensive high-level political efforts to de-escalate the current tensions and convince the parties to preserve the peace deal they all agreed to.

The United Nations and its aid partners in El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras have launched this year’s Humanitarian Response Plans to assist 2.2 million people in need, seeking a total of $306 million.

The Secretary-General arrived in South Africa from New York on Wednesday, 11 December. In Johannesburg, he attended a meeting of the G20 [Group of 20] sherpas and finance deputies. He delivered remarks before heading to Pretoria.

The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) today released its first major global assessment of salt-affected soils in 50 years. It shows that nearly 1.4 billion hectares of land — which is about 10 per cent of the total global land area — are already impacted by salinity.