News headlines in 2023, page 18

OSLO, Norway, Dec 06 (IPS) - The pulverising of Gaza now ranks amongst the worst assaults on any civilian population in our time and age. Each day we see more dead children and new depths of suffering for innocent people enduring this hell.

NEW DELHI, India, Dec 06 (IPS) - We, a global coalition of over 50 civil society and human rights organizations from over 30 countries have co-developed the "Civil Society Manifesto for Ethical AI", a groundbreaking initiative aiming to steer AI policies towards safeguarding rights and deconolonising AI discourse. We question, and we are not the only ones: whose voices, ideas and values matter in AI ?

NEW YORK, Dec 6 2023 (IPS) - As COP28 delegates focus on the first Global Stocktake, there is no doubt that the race to net-zero greenhouse gas emissions is vital.

STOCKHOLM, Sweden, Dec 06 (IPS) - A dark cloud is hovering above human existence. It is a fairly illusory cloud haunting our minds and wellbeing, but also an actual, menacing, mostly invisible cloud that covers the Earth’s entire atmosphere. Saturated by greenhouse gases, this global threat increases with every year, threatening all life on Earth, causing increased flooding, extreme heat, draught, wild fires, rising sea levels, food and water scarcity, as well as diseases and mounting economic loss. This misery, caused by human greed, thoughtlessness, and self-aggrandizement, trigger human migration and armed conflicts.

KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia, Dec 06 (IPS) - Greater government reliance on consulting companies has greatly enriched them while also undermining state capacities, capabilities, national economies, progress, governance and legitimacy.

More than 90 countries underlined their commitment to UN Peacekeeping during a two-day conference in Accra, Ghana, that concluded on Wednesday.

Hundreds of teenagers from New York schools on Wednesday descended on UN Headquarters to discuss mental health, education, homelessness and systematic racism, as part of the build up to this weekend’s 75th anniversary of Human Rights Day.

Secretary-General António Guterres on Wednesday highlighted the importance of the UN’s core humanitarian response fund to deploy quick and strategic resources to global crises globally.

Authorities in Nigeria must investigate a string of deadly airstrikes over the past six years and hold those responsible to account, the UN human rights office, OHCHR, said on Wednesday.

If urgent steps are not taken to end the ongoing war and its dire humanitarian consequences in Ukraine, 2024 may be even more unpredictable and destructive, a senior UN official warned on Wednesday.