COVID-19 Updates

The heads of the world’s most powerful global finance, health, and trade organisations have joined forces to urge government leaders to fund a new $50 billion roadmap to help end the pandemic that has ravaged lives and livelihoods for the past 18 months, as well as lay the groundwork for a truly global recovery and improved health security.

Leaders of the International Monetary Fund, World Bank Group, World Health Organization, and World Trade Organization [Kristalina Georgieva, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, David Malpass, and Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala] said governments must act quickly or risk continued waves and explosive outbreaks of COVID-19, as well as more transmissible diseases.

The joint statement is based on a recent IMF staff analysis that stated that $50 billion in fresh investment is required to boost production capacity, supply, trade flows, and delivery, allowing for faster equitable distribution of diagnostics, oxygen, treatments, medical supplies, and vaccines. This injection would also have a significant positive impact on global economic growth.

Guatemalan Journalist Dedicates Career to Give Voice to Indigenous Groups

In an effort to amplify the voices of those affected by human rights and environmental issues, a Guatemalan journalist Quimy de León,helped found a media outlet that focuses on marginalized and indigenous communities.Now she is being recognized for that work with an international press freedom award. 

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North Korean women in China catch ‘Disco Fever’

A rare video clip that shows North Korean women — dispatched to China as workers — dancing with Chinese men to loud disco music, indicates that they are picking up elements of capitalist culture that would be forbidden in their restrictive home country.

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Russia’s Full-Scale Invasion Pushes Ukraine’s Drive Toward Digitization

Ukraine now a world leader in the driver, to digitize government services, from digital passports to apps that allow conscripts to update their details in the draft register or issue air alerts.

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As UN Warns Kabul’s Groundwater Could Deplete by 2030,Residents Wait for Hours to Collect Water

Due to acute water shortages, residents of Kabul often have to wait for drinking water for hours at the dwindling wells in the Afghan capital. Within the next five to six years, urbanization and climate change could deplete the city’s groundwater,the  United Nations cautions.

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Despite Risks,Unaccompanied Child Migrants Keep Crossing US Border 

One of the top entry points for migrants under the age of eighteen who enter the United States without proper documentation or adult companions is still South Texas.Although fewer crossings took place in the fiscal year 2024 than in previous years, the risks these children face remain concerning.

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Mary Jane Veloso, a Filipina on Death Row in Indonesia,is Coming Home

Mary Jane Veloso, a Filipina who has spent 14 years on death row in Indonesia, will be coming home but will stay behind bars for the immediate future after being transferred to the custody of Philippine authorities, officials said.

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Trapped in Lebanon, African Migrants Face Unemployment and Rockets

Many of the estimated 176,000 migrants living in Lebanon are African women who are working menial jobs.Many of them have been displaced since the start of the conflict and are facing uncertain futures.

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Permanent Representative of France Briefs Press After Security Council Meeting on Middle East

Nicolas de Rivière,Permanent Representative of France to the United Nations, briefs reporters after the UN Security Council meeting on the situation in the Middle East, including the Palestinian question.

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