In an unprecedented move, the UN Watch, an NGO based in Geneva whose mandate is to monitor the performance of the United Nations, took a scathing dig at Prime Minister Imran Khan and Pakistans inclusion in the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC)
South Asia’s climate risks are shared across countries. Rivers such as the Ganga, Brahmaputra and Indus do not respect national boundaries, and torrential rains in one country can lead to floods in another. Satellite data, flood forecasts and flood warnings could, therefore, be shared to enhance disaster preparedness across the region.
The disasters at Kedarnath and Nepal should therefore be read not simply as tragedies of the past or isolated episodes of extreme weather. They are warnings from a changing mountain system. The question before South Asia is whether we will continue to respond to each disaster after it occurs, or whether we will listen to what the mountains are telling us beforehand.
AI may genuinely extend the horizon over which seasonal climate risk can be estimated. For communities across South Asia living under the influence of the monsoon, a longer view could mean the difference between a farmer adjusting her planting in time and a family receiving a flood warning too late to act.
The broader lesson for South Asia is equally important. Hilly regions cannot be developed simply by transferring lowland infrastructure models into mountainous terrain. Investment has to respond to local economic systems, geography and environmental risks.
In an unprecedented move, the UN Watch, an NGO based in Geneva whose mandate is to monitor the performance of the United Nations, took a scathing dig at Prime Minister Imran Khan and Pakistans inclusion in the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC)
The United Nations Industrial Development Organization's (UNIDO) representative in India, Rene Van Berkel, has pressed on the need to keep a check on the emissions from the biomedical incinerators, the instruments in which medical waste is burnt, amid the double whammy of raging COVID-19 pandemic and rising air pollution
It may appear rather incredulous for many people to know that US President Donald Trump, who is facing his Democratic rival, Joe Biden, in the Nov 3 presidential election and has been the subject of global criticism from liberals, has supported the work of WFP to the hilt, writes Rajendra Shende for South Asia Monitor
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres called for efforts to boost women's meaningful participation in peace processes
A Bangladeshi contingent, serving with the United Nations Mission in South Sudan, provided essential drugs for more than 300 people in dire need at the Teaching Hospital in Wau, in the Western Bahr El Ghazel region
Global foreign direct investment (FDI) flows fell 49 per cent in the first half of 2020 compared to 2019, due to the economic fallout from Covid-19, according to a report by the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD)
The number of civilian casualties in Afghanistan has dropped by 30 per cent in the first nine months of this year, the lowest since 2012, the UN mission in the country said in a report on Tuesday
The United Nations General Assembly is canceling in-person meetings after five members of a country's mission tested positive for the COVID-19 virus, according to the president's spokesperson
Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama on Monday hailed the UN treaty banning nuclear weapons to enter into force in January, saying a step in the right direction to finding more enlightened and civilized arrangements for resolving conflicts
In a message to celebrate United Nations Day, China's UN Ambassador called for efforts to uphold multilateralism and to support the United Nations
Bangladesh has lodged an amended submission on the limits of its outer continental shelf in the Bay of Bengal to the United Nations
The United Nations Industrial Development Organisation (UNIDO) on Tuesday stressed the need to halt the spread of COVID-19 through all possible infection channels, including from contact with or mismanagement of infectious waste
A senior UN official has claimed that Al Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri has maintained close ties with the Afghan Taliban despite the latters assurance to the US to cut ties with the group
Bangladesh's Permanent Representative to the UN Ambassador Rabab Fatima has reiterated the importance of ensuring safety and security of the peacekeepers
The United Nation Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) Thursday warned that the ongoing armed violence in southern Helmand province is undermining the efforts for Afghan peace process as part of which representatives of the government and Taliban are holding negotiations for more than a month in Qatar