UN Top Stories

Indiscriminate bombings, rape and other crimes are continuing in Darfur, the Prosecutor for the International Criminal Court (ICC) said today, while noting that the Government of Sudan still refuses to cooperate with his office and its indicted President and other suspects remain at large.

Although tobacco use is not as prevalent in Africa as it is in other regions, that will change unless immediate action is taken, the United Nations health agency warned today as it announced a new tobacco control effort for the continent.

The United Nations refugee agency has welcomed Sri Lanka’s decision this week to allow greater freedom of movement for some 135,000 internally displaced persons (IDPs) remaining in 20 closed camps in the country’s north following the recently-ended civil conflict.

United Nations peacekeepers airlifted doctors and vaccines to remote and inaccessible regions of Côte d’Ivoire today as the Government opened its latest campaign to immunize over 6 million children against polio.

The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) has applauded the big leap taken by the South African Government towards achieving universal access to treatment for HIV for the country’s women and children living with the virus.

The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) today voiced its sadness at the death of Ikuo Hirayama, a survivor of the bombing of Hiroshima who became an eminent painter and advocate for the agency’s work.

States must step up efforts to help landmine victims - including women, children and indigenous populations - in especially vulnerable situations, a senior United Nations human rights official has said.

Global measles deaths have fallen by 78 per cent within the past decade, with vaccinations saving some 4.3 million lives, but the disease could make a deadly comeback if funding and political will are not sustained, a United Nations-backed study warned today.

Top officials of the United Nations war crimes tribunals today called for Serbia’s "critical" cooperation in capturing the two remaining top fugitives accused of atrocities in the Balkan conflicts of the 1990s and denounced Kenya for failing to cooperate in the case of a major suspect in the Rwandan genocide of 1994.

The peace process in Burundi has witnessed significant progress in recent months but the country needs help to ensure successful elections next year and to tackle challenges such as human rights abuses, corruption and weak institutions, Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon says in a new report.

The postal industry annually generates at least 26 million tons of carbon dioxide, accounting for less than 1 per cent of total greenhouse gas emissions, the United Nations Universal Postal Union (UPU) announced today in its first such global inventory.

Internet users can now explore World Heritage sites such as France’s Palace of Versailles and the United Kingdom’s Stonehenge online thanks to a new partnership between the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) and Internet search giant Google.