At Abu Dhabi forum, Ban calls for ensuring clean energy future for all Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon (2nd right) with participants at the Second Assembly of the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) in Abu Dhabi. Photo: UN Photo/Evan Schneider Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon on Sunday called on participants at a forum in Abu Dhabi to help advance the […]

Concluding its work, UN refugee agency closes office in Timor-Leste President José Ramos-Horta of Timor-Leste (left), presents gifts to UNHCR’s James Lynch at a ceremony marking the closure of the refugee agency’s office in Dili. Photo: UNHCR/K.McKinsey The United Nations refugee agency has closed its office in the Timor-Leste capital, Dili, after more than 12 years, a […]

UN agency seeks solution for long-term refugees in eastern Sudan High Commissioner António Guterres with Eritrean and Ethiopian refugees in Shagarab I camp, eastern Sudan. Photo: UNHCR/A.Awad The head of the United Nations refugee agency has praised efforts to find a lasting solution for tens of thousands of long-term refugees in eastern Sudan, most of […]

Supermodel and UN advocate Gisele Bündchen backs access to energy in Kenya UNEP Goodwill Ambassador Gisele Bündchen. Photo: UNEP Supermodel and United Nations Goodwill Ambassador Gisele Bündchen has visited Kenya to experience firsthand the reality of energy poverty and to see how lives are being transformed in the East African country by making sustainable energy […]

Statement from Secretary Sebelius for Martin Luther King, Jr. Day – Jan. 2012 Honoring Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. by Eliminating Injustice in Health Care Today, as we honor the legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., we reflect on our own response to his call for justice. “Of all the forms of inequality,” Dr. […]

Harvard Thinks Green: Why Physicians Must Protect the Global Environment. … … Dr. Eric Chivian from Harvard Medical School, the Director of the Center for Health and the Global Environment and Assistant Clinical Professor of Psychiatry, named by Time Magazine in 2008 as “one of the most influential people in the world” and a recipient […]

UN agency worried about insecurity at Somali refugee camps in Horn of Africa UNHCR Dadaab camps, Kenya. Photo: UNHCR The United Nations refugee agency said today it is increasingly concerned about insecurity in and around camps hosting hundreds of thousands of Somali refugees in the Horn of Africa. “The situation is particularly worrying, complex and […]

Rochester Scientist Leads National Fight against Lead When the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention needed a scientist to lead the panel charged with making recommendations regarding hazardous levels of lead in children, they turned to one of Rochester’s own. Deborah A. Slechta, Ph.D. Deborah Cory-Slechta, Ph.D., professor of Environmental Medicine and an internationally recognized authority on […]

South Sudan: UN reports damage to health centres during Jonglei clashes These orphaned children received food from WFP after a humanitarian mission arrived in the town of Pibor in South Sudan’s Jonglei state on 3 January 2012. Photo: WFP/Rehan Zahid A number of health facilities in South Sudan’s troubled state of Jonglei were damaged and […]

UNHCR chief ends Sudan visit with relief for ‘old’ refugees, risks for new ones High Commissioner António Guterres with Eritrean and Ethiopian refugees in Shagarab I camp, eastern Sudan. Photo: UNHCR/A.Awad KHARTOUM, Sudan, January 13 (UNHCR) – UN refugee agency chief António Guterres ended a visit to Sudan this week by hailing efforts towards lasting solutions for […]