Haji Mohammad Shafi spent 44 years in Pakistan before he was forced to leave. He sold everything he owned and returned to Afghanistan with his five children, arriving with almost nothing.

Food waste is helping to fuel global warming, one half-eaten sandwich at a time. 

Amid rising tensions, extreme weather impacts and strikes on nuclear infrastructure in war-torn Iran and Ukraine, UN Member States returned to the core issue of disarmament on Tuesday, closing out the General Assembly’s High-Level Week with calls for greater safeguards.

The Security Council met in New York on the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) Tuesday, where clashes between Government forces and M23 rebels continue in the east, despite a series of peace agreements. Ambassadors focused on ceasefire monitoring, rising tensions between the DRC and Rwanda and the country’s worst Ebola outbreak on record, which has killed more than 3,900 people.  

In the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), health workers fighting the country’s largest-ever Ebola outbreak are struggling to overcome critical challenges to patient care, the UN World Health Organization (WHO) warned on Tuesday.

Heavy fighting in Yemen is fuelling concerns of an uptick in cholera, measles and other preventable diseases, as overcrowding at displacement sites threatens to overwhelm the limited healthcare services still open.

After six days of speeches from the UN General Assembly podium, one word rose above all others: peace.
  This final edition of The Takeaway distils the messages he said reverberated through the Assembly Hall and looks at where the 193-member body goes from here.
 

“No country is free of racism.” That warning from US youth activist Marley Dias set the tone on Monday as UN Member States reinvigorated global efforts against racism, discrimination and xenophobia with a new declaration.

The Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) told the UN General Assembly on Monday that its status as a nuclear-armed State was irreversible, arguing that its military capabilities were necessary to safeguard the country’s sovereignty and maintain peace on the Korean Peninsula.

South Sudan remains committed to holding general elections in December to conclude its transition period, the country’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations Cecilia Adout Majok Adeng, told the General Assembly on Monday, calling for all sanctions, including the arms embargo to be lifted. 

Sudan’s Foreign Minister addressed the UN General Assembly on Monday in place of Chairperson of the Transitional Sovereignty Council, Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, whose visa application was rejected by Washington.

The continuing conflict in the Middle East is disrupting global energy markets and pushing up fuel prices, with knock-on effects far beyond the region.