The 82 girls from Chibok, Nigeria, recently released by the Boko Haram terrorist group, have an "uphill road to climb" reintegrating into society, a UN expert has warned. Urmila Bhoola, the Special Rapporteur on contemporary forms of slavery expressed deep concern about the plight of the 115 girls who remain in captivity. In 2014, close [...]

Listen to a bulletin of news and features from the United Nations, with Jocelyne Sambira and Matthew Wells. In today’s programme: teenage deaths are "shocking and preventable" a new report by the UN health agency says; and the 82 schoolgirls recently released from Boko Haram captivity in Nigeria have "an uphill road to climb back [...]

What's being described as a landmark five-year partnership has been agreed between the UN human rights office (OHCHR) and the US computing giant, Microsoft. OHCHR said on Tuesday that the US $ 5 million partnership would not prevent the agency from carrying out its mandate. As OHCHR spokesperson Laurent Sauveur explained to Daniel Johnson, the [...]

More than 3,000 teenagers die every day but nearly all of those deaths could be avoided, the World Health Organization (WHO) said on Tuesday. Road traffic accidents, lower respiratory infections and suicide are the leading causes of adolescent mortality, the UN health agency highlighted in a new report. As WHO's Dr Anthony Costello explained to [...]

  “Alarm bells” should be ringing over CAR civilian and UN peacekeeper attacks – Zeid "Alarm bells" should be ringing that armed groups in Central African Republic (CAR) are targeting and killing civilians in rural areas that have until recently escaped a wave of deadly violence. The warning, from UN High Commissioner for Human Rights [...]

Peacekeepers under fire again in Mali UN Peacekeepers with the MINUMSA stabilization mission have come under fire again in their camp in Timbuktu, according to reports on Tuesday. Four blue helmets and three members of the Malian armed forces were injured when eight shells were reportedly fired in the direction of the airport, close to [...]

Listen to a bulletin of news and features from the United Nations, with Jocelyne Sambira and Matthew Wells. In today’s programme: the UN is calling for "urgent funds" to save South Sudan from "the brink"; and … members of the Security Council hear why rape survivors should never again face the "prison of stigma".

Investment in basic education is the key to breaking a cycle of poverty that is preventing one in four children in the Middle East and North Africa from reaching their full potential. That's according to UN Children's Fund (UNICEF) which published a study on Monday showing that 25% continue to be trapped in poverty, fuelled [...]

The humanitarian crisis faced by South Sudan's people "is one of the greatest tragedies of our time". That's according to Filippo Grandi, UN High Commissioner for Refugees, speaking in Geneva on Monday. Along with World Food Programme chief David Beasley, Mr Grandi called for donors to step up support for refugees fleeing South Sudan, as [...]

A new round of Intra-Syrian talks is set to be more "business-like" than before as part of a renewed push to halt the more than six-year conflict, UN negotiator Staffan de Mistura said on Monday in Geneva. Speaking to journalists, Mr de Mistura said that beginning on Tuesday, his discussions with the government of Syria [...]