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UN Chief Welcomes Afghanistan Ceasefire
United Nations (UN) Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Saturday said he welcomed the announcement by the Taliban and the Afghan government of a ceasefire to enable the Afghan people to celebrate the Eid al-Fitr holiday in peace. In a statement, the secretary-general urged all parties concerned to seize this opportunity and embrace an Afghan-led and Afghan-owned peace process. Only a peaceful settlement can bring an end to the suffering in Afghanistan, said Stephane ...
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UN Chief Suggests World Leaders Send Video Statements for Annual Meeting
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has suggested that world leaders send video statements for the world body’s annual meeting in September because it is “highly unlikely” they will be able to travel to New York during the coronavirus pandemic. New York is the epicenter of the United States’ COVID-19 outbreak. The disease, caused by the new coronavirus, has afflicted more than 4.8 million people and killed over 319,000 globally. The US’s death toll ...
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WHO Agrees to Independent Investigation into its Coronavirus Response
World Health Organisation member states agreed Tuesday to an independent probe into the UN agency’s Covid-19 response as US criticism mounted over its handling of the pandemic. Countries taking part in the WHO’s annual assembly, held virtually for the first time, adopted a resolution by consensus calling for an “impartial, independent and comprehensive evaluation” of the international response to the crisis, including a probe of WHO actions and “their timelines pertaining to ...
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WHO Chief Sscientist: ‘Four to Five-Year’ Struggle Ahead Before Containing COVID-19
Soumya Swaminathan, the World Health Organization’s (WHO) chief scientist, attempted to temper expectations of a “crystal ball” timeline for the containment of the COVID-19 novel coronavirus on Wednesday, expressing that vaccines are not guaranteed and the pandemic may even take a turn for the worse. “I would say in a four to five-year timeframe we could be looking at controlling this,” the expert said to the Financial Times’ Global Boardroom webinar on ...
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WHO: US and Brazil Did Not Take Warnings Seriously
The United States and Brazil failed to take warnings issued by the World Health Organisation seriously right from the beginning of the coronavirus outbreak, Margaret Harris, a spokesperson for the international agency, told a virtual briefing on Tuesday. The United States currently reports 1,298,287 confirmed cases of the coronavirus as well as 78,652 deaths, which makes the United States the leading nation in terms of both the number of infections and fatalities. ...
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UN Chief Says Funding of WHO, Humanitarians Should Not Be Cut Amid COVID-19
The coronavirus pandemic requires an unprecedented global response, and reducing the funding of the World Health Organisation, which champions that response, is untimely, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said in an interview. 'Once we have finally turned the page on COVID-19, there will be time to look back fully and understand how such a disease emerged and spread its devastation so quickly across the globe, and how all those involved reacted to the ...
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WHO Has Funding Gap of 1.3Bln for COVID-19 Response in 2020: Chief
The World Health Organization (WHO) is lacking $1.3 billion for its coronavirus response in 2020, Director-General of WHO Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said Friday. 'The updated plan estimates that WHO requires $1.7 billion dollars to respond to COVID-19 across the three levels of the organization between now and the end of 2020. This estimate includes the funds that WHO has already received to date, leaving WHO's COVID-19 response with a funding gap ...
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Coronavirus Has Sparked 'Tsunami Of Hate And Xenophobia': UN Chief
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Friday called for an 'all-out effort' to end the 'tsunami of hate and xenophobia' sparked by the Covid-19 coronavirus pandemic, without naming specific countries. 'The pandemic continues to unleash a tsunami of hate and xenophobia, scapegoating and scaremongering,' Guterres said in a statement. 'Anti-foreigner sentiment has surged online and in the streets. Anti-Semitic conspiracy theories have spread and Covid-19-related anti-Muslim attacks have occurred.' According to Guterres, migrants ...
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UN Appeals for $4.7 Billion Dollars More to Fight Virus Pandemic
The United Nations on Thursday issued a new appeal for $4.7 billion in funding to 'protect millions of lives and stem the spread of coronavirus in fragile countries.' The money is on top of the $2 billion the UN already called for when it launched its global humanitarian response plan on March 25. It has received about half of that money so far. 'The most devastating and destabilizing effects' of the novel ...
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