The UN Security Council has backed a resolution authorising the transition of the Kenyan-led support mission for Haiti into a new Gang Suppression Force, in close cooperation with Haitian authorities. US Ambassador Michael Waltz said it offered new hope for the country's future as “a key first step” to address the humanitarian and security crisis there. Follow the meeting live below; UN News app users need to click here for coverage.

Lifesaving relief efforts to help remote Afghan communities devastated by last month’s deadly earthquake have already been hit by the de facto authorities’ decision to cut internet access nationwide, UN aid agencies said on Tuesday.

Peace in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) “is still mostly a promise”, the head of the UN peacekeeping mission in the country, MONUSCO, told the Security Council on Tuesday.

Doctors in Gaza are warning of a surge in respiratory illnesses as families – cut off from basic supplies – burn plastic and cardboard to cook and keep warm. They say the outbreak will worsen unless life-saving medicines, fuel and food are allowed into the devastated territory.

Faced with a deadly outbreak of cholera and a lack of sanitation infrastructure, one Haitian mother sparked a community movement that has transformed her neighbourhood – and saved multiple lives.

UN agencies reiterated calls for an urgent ceasefire in Gaza on Tuesday to help alleviate Palestinian suffering, as a new US 20-point plan raised hopes of a halt to the fighting.

CIVICUS discusses North Korea’s closed civic space with Hanna Song, Executive Director of the Database Center for North Korean Human Rights (NKDB). Based in Seoul, South Korea, NKDB documents systematic human rights violations in North Korea through testimonies from escapees, and has built the world’s largest private database of such abuses.

As the COP30 approaches amid darkening geopolitical clouds—marked by rising rightwing extremism, corporate backtracking and rising militarism—Ali T. Sheikh, Pakistan’s leading expert on sustainable development and climate change, views the world’s largest diplomatic gathering with a mix of apprehension and caution.

NEW YORK, September 29 (IPS) - In her opening statement, Annalena Baerbock (Germany), President of the 80th UN General Assembly, only the fifth female to hold this position over 80 years, stated, “Our future as an institution will also be shaped by the selection of the next Secretary-General. And here we must pause and reflect. In nearly eighty years, this Organization has never chosen a woman for that role. One might wonder how out of four billion potential candidates, there could not be found a single one. … Like 80 years ago, we are standing at a crossroads.”

The United Nations remains “the house of diplomacy and dialogue” in a divided world, General Assembly President Annalena Baerbock said as she closed the 80th session’s general debate, urging nations to convert the week’s momentum into concrete action on peace, climate change and institutional reform.