News headlines in 2023, page 12

DUBAI, Dec 12 (IPS) - The United State's contribution to the Loss and Damage Fund equals nine minutes of Pentagon spending, says Jeffrey D. Sachs, a world-renowned economist, bestselling author, innovative educator, and global leader in sustainable development.

WASHINGTON, Dec 12 (IPS) - As it strives to be the prototype environmental treaty of this era, the Minamata Convention on Mercury continues its razor-like focus on ending all major uses of mercury. Emerging as the force leading the charge is the Global South, particularly the Africa Region, whose proposals led to hard-charging changes addressing dental amalgam, mercury-based skin creams, and fluorescent lights.

Half of the world’s population is not fully covered by essential health services and two billion people are impoverished because they must cover medical bills out-of-pocket.

UN peacekeeping missions in Sub-Saharan Africa are operating under more challenging political and security conditions due to a multiplication of crises and a “climate of division” amongst Member States, particularly in the Security Council. That’s according to the head of UN Peacekeeping, Jean-Pierre Lacroix.

The UN General Assembly met on Tuesday afternoon in Emergency Special Session on the decades long Israel-Palestine conflict and as the ongoing crisis in Gaza shows no signs of abating.

Myanmar is now the world’s largest opium producer, the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) reported on Tuesday, as the economic and political crisis following the 2021 coup and widening conflict between the military and armed groups continues to drive farmers towards illicit opium poppy production.

World leaders gathered in Geneva on Tuesday to celebrate the 75th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), calling for new guardrails to protect rights amid a surge of conflict and other challenges.

The last barely functioning hospital in northern Gaza is a “humanitarian disaster zone”, the UN World Health Organization (WHO) said on Tuesday, highlighting the disastrous consequences of ongoing Israeli bombardment for critically ill and injured civilians across the enclave.

DUBAI, Dec 12 (IPS) - On November 30, the first day of COP28, the much-awaited Loss and Damage Fund—a landmark decision to compensate the world’s most climate-affected and climate-vulnerable people—was declared operational. Announcing the decision, COP28 President Dr Sultan Al Jaber said, ‘the fact that we have been able to achieve such a significant milestone on the first day of this COP is unprecedented. This is historic.”

DUBAI, Dec 12 (IPS) - Joshua Amponsem, co-director of the Youth Climate Justice Fund, believes it is time to ensure climate finance and social justice issues are elevated to the top of the agenda and negotiations at COP28.