Ongoing talks to get the Iran nuclear deal back on track indicate “additional effort and patience” are required for its full restoration, the UN political affairs chief told the UN Security Council in New York on Tuesday.

The UN Climate Change Conference (COP26), held last month in Glasgow, was defined by a “reinvigorated multilateralism”, a top UN official said on Tuesday during an online discussion on how the summit’s outcomes will impact climate action and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

BEIJING, Dec 14 (IPS) - The COVID-19 pandemic has moved us farther away from the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Data shows that the pandemic has pushed a further 124 million people into extreme poverty. Global poverty is now expected to be at 7% by 2030 – only marginally below the level in 2015.

The President of the General Assembly on Tuesday announced a New Year resolution on vaccine equity, calling on governments to come together on this issue ahead of a major event in mid-January.

The Omicron variant is “probably” now present in most of the world’s countries and it would be a mistake to dismiss the COVID-19 strain as “mild”, said the head of the UN health agency (WHO) on Tuesday.

Bulawayo, Zimbabwe, Dec 14 (IPS) - Food spoilage forced smallholder farmers out of pocket and out of business – until an entrepreneur came up with a cool idea.

Yemen is teetering on a new “fragmented and bloody” chapter of war as military escalation and conflict escalates, Special Envoy Hans Grundberg told the Security Council on Tuesday, calling for “restraint, de-escalation and dialogue”.

Respect for fundamental rights and freedoms by the de facto authorities in Afghanistan is critical to ensuring stability in the country, the UN Deputy High Commissioner for Human Rights said on Tuesday in Geneva. 

An 83 per cent surge in COVID-19 cases during the past week in Africa, driven by the Delta and Omicron variants, is causing fewer deaths than previous spikes, the World Health Organization (WHO) revealed on Tuesday, but more waves could be on the way, due to the continent’s slow vaccine rollout.

BANGKOK, Thailand, Dec 14 (IPS) - Transport ministers from across Asia and the Pacific are meeting this week to consider a potentially transformational agenda for how people and goods are moved around the region and across the globe.