UN

22 January 2008 -- Foreign ministers of the five permanent U.N. Security Council members and Germany said Tuesday they have agreed on the contents of a new sanctions resolution against Iran over its nuclear program. U.S. officials say it will toughen travel bans and asset freezes against Iranian leaders.

The agreement, which breaks a months-long stalemate over terms of a resolution, was announced by German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier in a brief statement capping a two-hour meeting in Berlin.    » read more »

17 January 2008 -- United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon has welcomed the reduction in violence across Iraq and urged similar progress in the political arena.

In a report to the Security Council Wednesday, Mr. Ban said "improvements in the political arena" are necessary to sustain recent gains in the security situation.

Mr. Ban expressed disappointment at the political process in Iraq, saying it "has not shown the degree of progress that many had hoped for."    » read more »

12 January 2008 -- Pakistan's President Prevez Musharraf has ruled out a U.N. inquiry into the assassination of opposition leader and former prime minister, Benazir Bhutto.

Ms. Bhutto's party has been calling for a U.N. investigation, comparing her death to the 2005 killing of former Lebanese prime minister, Rafik Hariri. Many Lebanese blame Syria for that killing.    » read more »

14 January 2008 -- Former U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan is expected in the Kenyan capital, Nairobi Tuesday to try his luck at mediation to resolve Kenya’s post-election political crisis. African Union chairman President John Kufuor of Ghana failed last week to get President Mwai Kibaki and Raila Odinga of the opposition Orange Democratic Movement to meet face to face. Meanwhile, the opposition has called for three days of rallies from this Wednesday to protest the results of Kenya’s December 27th presidential election.    » read more »

08 January 2008 -- The U.N. refugee agency says it is seeking $261 million this year to help Iraqis driven from their homes by violence.

Tuesday's appeal by the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees is for money to help more than two-million people who are internally displaced or who have fled to neighboring countries, primarily Syria and Jordan.    » read more »

05 January 2008 -- The husband of slain Pakistani opposition leader and former prime minister Benazir Bhutto has again called for a United Nations investigation into her death.

In an opinion piece published in The Washington Post newspaper Saturday, Asif Ali Zardari said a probe conducted by Pakistan's government will have no credibility. As he put it, "one does not put the fox in charge of the henhouse."

Zardari also urged the United States and Britain to support his call for a U.N. investigation.    » read more »

20 December 2007 -- UNICEF recommends that women breast feed during the first few months of their baby’s life to improve the child’s chances of survival. Health specialists say that’s because of the important ingredients available in the milk, especially in the portion called colostrum. That message and others were emphasized at a forum held at the headquarters of the Development Communications Network in Lagos, Nigeria’s commercial capital recently to mark annual breastfeeding week.    » read more »

18 December 2007 -- The global campaign against the death penalty secured a landmark victory on Tuesday when the United Nations General Assembly endorsed the call for a worldwide moratorium (suspension) on executions.

In a landslide result, 104 UN member states voted in favour of the ground-breaking resolution. 54 countries voted against, while there were 25 abstentions.

Amnesty International welcomes this timely resolution, passed at the UN headquarters in New York City, as a clear recognition of the international trend towards worldwide abolition of the death penalty.    » read more »

19 December 2007 -- Delegates from 111 countries met in New Delhi, India, the first week of December to assess the progress in combating avian flu and the preparations for a human influenza pandemic. Two of the public health officials leading that effort summarized the results of the conference at a news briefing in Washington. .

Since it was first diagnosed in Asia in 1996, the virus that causes avian influenza, or bird flu, has forced the destruction of millions of infected poultry flocks in nearly 60 countries. More than 200 people have died after contracting the so-called H5N1 virus.    » read more »

17 December 2007 -- Discussions over the aims and timing of a new global climate change treaty have wrapped up in Bali after two weeks of often turbulent bargaining. The next step will be two years of negotiations over the new treaty itself, which will become a successor to the Kyoto Protocol on climate change. Thousands of delegates took part in the United Nations-sponsored conference, to discuss the man-made emissions that most scientists believe are changing the earth's climate.    » read more »

13 December 2007 -- The head of the United Nations Climate Change Conference is warning that a deadlock between the United States and the European Union over greenhouse gas emission targets may derail the conference.

From the start, officials here have emphasized that the aim of the Climate Change Conference is only to get negotiations started on a new global effort against climate change. These negotiations are to lead to a replacement for the Kyoto Protocol on climate change, which will expire in 2012.    » read more »

Secretary-General Urges Breakthrough In Bali

Following is the text of UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s address to the High-Level Segment of the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Bali, Indonesia, today, 12 December:

Let me thank the Government and people of Indonesia for hosting us, and all of you for being here.    » read more »

Statement by Peter Frumhoff, director of science and policy at UCS

BALI, INDONESIA (December 6, 2007) – More than 100 leading climate scientists issued a statement today at the United Nation's climate change summit, urging negotiators to draft a treaty limiting global warming to no more than 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industry temperatures (roughly equivalent to a 2 degree Fahrenheit rise above current temperatures). The U.N. is hosting the summit in Bali, where delegates from nearly 190 nations are negotiating a follow-on treaty to the Kyoto Protocol, which expires in 2012.    » read more »

10 December 2007 -- Delegates to the U.N. climate change conference are locked in debate over whether to set tough new limits on greenhouse-gas emission, with the United States leading the fight against firm limits. On Indonesia's Bali Island delegates are trying to draft a successor to the Kyoto Protocol on climate change.

The U.N. climate change talks being held in Bali hit a snag after the United States said it will not approve a draft agreement setting firm targets for greenhouse gas emissions.    » read more »

10 December 2007 -- Industrialized nations have been blamed for a large percentage of the emissions said to be causing global warming, but U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon says it is time for developing nations to take more responsibility for combating climate change. Mr. Ban spoke in Bangkok on his way to climate change talks in Bali.

Nations such as China and India have resisted wider emissions control out of fear that new regulations will hamper the fast-growing industries that power their breakneck economic growth.    » read more »