The Black Lives Matter movement that is sweeping the world, has its origins in the transatlantic slave trade of the 16th century, and new impetus today, to honour and preserve the resting places of those who were enslaved, and their descendants.  

Back in the 1990s, Peggy King Jorde was working as a designer in the New York City mayor’s office when she heard that a building slated for construction was due to be built on top of an African-American burial ground in lower Manhattan. 

Coming from a family steeped in the civil rights movement, she swung into action to preserve the site, becoming heavily involved in saving others across the world, including one on the remote island of St. Helena, midway between Africa and the Americas. 

Ms. Jorde spoke to Liz Scaffidi about her work, and the importance of the island to her own family history. 

Empowering girls in Africa can put them on the fast track to achieve their aspirations and basic rights to which they’re entitled, but too often denied.  

That’s according to the UN Deputy Secretary-General, Amina Mohammed, who is on a two-week solidarity visit to West Africa and the Sahel to underscore the United Nations’ support for the region, during the on-going COVID-19 pandemic.  

In a wide-ranging interview with the UN mission MINUSMA’s radio network, Mikado FM, the deputy UN chief discussed the importance of education as a foundation to advancing gender equality.  

Mikado’s Joyce de Pina began by asking her what the best way forward was for empowering women and girls. 

As the UN’s first-ever Victims’ Rights Advocate, Jane Connors has to confront an uncomfortable reality: sexual abuse and exploitation – or SEA for short - carried out by UN personnel.

Her most recent report detailed eighty SEA cases at peacekeeping and political missions in 2019, and 95 allegations recorded at other UN entities.

Three years on from the start of her mandate, which began in September 2017, UN News’s Conor Lennon, spoke to Ms. Connors who said that, since then, it has become more apparent that the on-going issue of sexual abuse and exploitation goes well beyond the peacekeeping sector.

The southeast Asian nation of the Philippines has been pummeled by the third major storm in three weeks, adding to the pain and suffering of thousands of families. 

Typhoon Vamco (locally known as Ulysses) made landfall on Wednesday night and although it is much weaker than Super Typhoon Goni, it brought catastrophic flooding across the capital Manila, a sprawling and densely populated city.  

UN News’s Vibhu Mishra spoke to the UN migration agency’s Kristin Dadey, Chief of Mission of IOM Philippines, who had just driven to Marikina, central Manila. She began by describing the scene, just hours after the latest storm’s arrival. 

The opening of two provincial offices for UN agencies operating in Papua New Guinea, reaffirms the Organization’s commitment to sustainable peace and development, senior officials there have said.  

The new offices are in Tari and Mendi, located in the remote Highlands Region, a mountainous and heavily forested part of the Pacific island nation that is difficult to access. 

Gianluca Rampolla is the UN Resident Coordinator for the country, often referred to by the acronym “PNG”. 

He told Julia Dean at the UN Information Centre in Australia, how the new investment in the highlands, builds on earlier action to address basic needs after a deadly earthquake in February 2018, and to promote peace in the wake of inter-communal conflict. 

Mr. Rampolla began by describing the Highlands Region.

The opening of two provincial offices for UN agencies operating in Papua New Guinea, reaffirms the Organization’s commitment to sustainable peace and development.  

Gianluca Rampolla, the UN Resident Coordinator for the country, spoke to Julia Dean at the UN Information Centre in Australia about the new investment.  

The COVID-19 pandemic could threaten food security across the entire world, if urgent action is not taken.  

That’s prompted the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) to launch a new COVID-19 Response and Recovery Programme, which aims to mitigate the immediate impacts of the pandemic while also strengthening food systems and livelihoods in the long-term.  

In this interview, FAO’s Charlotta Lomas speaks to the agency’s Deputy Director-General Beth Bechdol, who describes what the plan entails, and why a global response is badly needed. 

In Pakistan, women are major contributors to agricultural production and food security for their families, but like many other nations, the COVID pandemic has exacerbated an already alarming gender gap there.

That’s especially true for rural women, where the amount of work and responsibility that they have to shoulder has gone up, leading to a decrease in living standards, as they’re forced to stay at home and care for others.

Mina Dowlatchahi, Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) Representative to Pakistan, explains to Charlotta Lomas, how the UN agency is supporting women in the countryside, despite the corrosive impact of the pandemic. 

Ensuring forests retain their rich biodiversity and continue contributing to the health and safety of communities everywhere, can help boost recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic.

That’s the view Ewald Rametsteiner, Forestry Deputy Director at the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) who points out that deforestation and degradation, is one way that dangerous viruses such as Ebola, have made their way into the human population in recent decades.

In this interview with FAO’s Charlotta Lomas, he explains why the forestry sector is important to building back from the ravages of the coronavirus.