News headlines in 2023, page 161

Celebrating the union of body, mind and soul, hundreds of yoga enthusiasts - including UN officials and staffers - filled the green expanse of the North Lawn at UN Headquarters in New York on Wednesday to mark the ninth celebration of the International Day of Yoga, observed each 21 June.

The multiple restrictions placed on women and girls by Afghanistan’s de facto rulers are costing the Taliban “both domestic and international legitimacy” and are highly unpopular across the country, said the top UN official based there on Wednesday.

NAIROBI, Jun 20 (IPS) - Oil palm has brought significant benefits and prosperity to Liberia. The export of crude palm oil is a major source of foreign exchange earnings for the government. The palm oil crop covers more than 1 million hectares, hundreds of thousands are employed in the palm oil sector, and at least 21 percent of the farming households produce palm oil.

NAIROBI, Jun 20 (IPS) - Home Away From Home is the theme of World Refugee Day 2023. However, for many, including human rights activists who have fled their homes, a decline in civil rights in their host countries means their lives are often endangered and their activism curtailed.While leaving one’s country and becoming a refugee is a last resort, it is a decision that many, like Steve Kitsa, have had to make. As conflict becomes increasingly protracted in many African countries, many others will take this step.

BANGKOK, Thailand, Jun 20 (IPS) - Each year, the births of 64 million children under the age of five and deaths of 8.4 million people are invisible to governments in Asia and the Pacific. Most countries in the region are yet to achieve universal civil registration, leaving many people without a legal identity and, as a result, invisible to the State.

Radwa Sharaf is a UN refugee agency, UNHCR, staff member tasked with working with celebrities, content creators, and influencers to promote the work of the organization to a broader audience in Egypt, home to more than 293,000 registered refugees and asylum-seekers. On World Refugee Day, she shared her story with UN News.

The cross-border impact of the crisis in Sudan is unfurling along multiple fronts, and action is urgently needed to ease rising tensions that has already resulted in deadly clashes, the UN Secretary-General’s Special Representative for South Sudan told the Security Council on Tuesday.

Despite deteriorating border security, humanitarian and human rights challenges, the Central African Republic (CAR) is committed to a constitutional referendum and local elections, the Security Council heard on Tuesday.

The Secretary-General on Tuesday said he was disappointed by the “slowing pace of inspections” under the UN-brokered Black Sea Initiative – the grain and fertilizer deal which has allowed millions of tonnes of food exports to leave Ukraine.

The UN’s Middle East envoy said on Tuesday he was “deeply alarmed” at the continuing cycle of violence in Israel and Palestine, and “appalled by the continued loss of civilian lives.”