Switzerland

GENEVA, Sept 2 (NNN-AGENCIES) — Over half of all people in the world have no social protections, the United Nations said, even after the pandemic spurred countries to offer more services to their populations.

In a Wednesday report on the state of social protection globally, the UN’s International Labour Organization said that 4.1 billion people were living without any social safety net of any kind.

GENEVA, Aug 30 (Reuters) - A plane carrying World Health Organization medicines and health supplies landed in Afghanistan on Monday, the UN health agency said, the first shipment to get in since the country came under the control of the Taliban.

"After days of non-stop work to find a solution, I am very pleased to say that we have now been able to partially replenish stocks of health facilities in Afghanistan and ensure that — for now – WHO-supported health services can continue," Ahmed Al Mandhari, WHO regional director for the eastern Mediterranean, said in a statement.

GENEVA (AP) — The trial opened Monday of an influential Olympic official accused of forgery in an alleged plot that implicated political rivals in Kuwait in a coup attempt.

Sheikh Ahmad al-Fahad al-Sabah has been publicly sidelined as an IOC member and president of the global group of national Olympic bodies, known as ANOC, after he was indicted in November 2018.

Long known as the kingmaker of Olympic elections, Sheikh Ahmad’s influence grew when winning the ANOC leadership election in 2012 and a year later he was an ally helping Thomas Bach win the IOC presidency.

GENEVA — The head of the World Health Organization’s European branch says he agrees with the top U.S. infectious diseases expert that a third dose of coronavirus vaccines can help protect the people most vulnerable, and it shouldn’t be seen as a “luxury booster.”

Dr. Hans Kluge cited “deeply worrying” levels of high transmission, saying 33 countries among the 53 in the WHO Europe region have reported an increase in case counts of 10 percent or more over the past two weeks.

GENEVA, Aug 27 (Reuters) - U.N. officials appealed for $800 million to fill a chronic funding gap for Afghanistan on Friday, with a senior aid official describing the situation as "catastrophic" with at least one third of people expected to be facing hunger.

"Humanitarian needs are catastrophic, are at large-scale and are increasing," Wafaa Saeed Abdelatef of the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), said at a virtual briefing. "These humanitarian needs are coming from decades of conflict, compounded by drought and COVID-19."

GENEVA, Aug 27 (Reuters) - Up to half a million Afghans could flee their homeland by year-end, the U.N. refugee agency UNHCR said on Friday, appealing to all neighbouring countries to keep their borders open for those seeking safety.

As a crisis unfolds in the country, a few thousand Afghans have been recorded as entering Iran daily, while traders continue going back and forth from Afghanistan to Pakistan, said Kelly Clements, deputy U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees.

GENEVA (AP) — The U.N. human rights chief warned Tuesday that she had received credible reports of severe abuses in areas under Taliban control in Afghanistan, including “summary executions” of civilians and security forces who had laid down their arms and restrictions on women.

Michelle Bachelet urged the Human Rights Council to take “bold and vigorous action” to monitor the rights situation in Afghanistan, where the Taliban’s stunning takeover raised fears that they will return the country to the brutal rule they imposed when they were last in power.

GENEVA, August 19. /TASS/: The Nord Stream 2 AG company labelled media reports saying that the construction of the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline would be completed on August 23 as ‘speculations’. A source in the company told TASS on Thursday that it "cannot confirm" this information.

GENEVA, Aug 17 (Reuters) - The Taliban have assured the United Nations it can pursue humanitarian work in drought-hit Afghanistan, where the world body will insist on women's rights and access to all civilians, the top U.N. aid official in the country said on Tuesday.

In an interview with Reuters, Ramiz Alakbarov, the U.N. humanitarian coordinator for Afghanistan, urged Western donors to keep funding its work in a country where 18.5 million people, nearly half the population, depend on life-saving assistance.

GENEVA, Aug 13 (Reuters) - The World Health Organization said on Friday it was setting up a new group to trace the origins of the coronavirus, seeking to end what it called "political point scoring" that had hampered investigations.

The inability of the WHO to say where and how the virus began spreading has fuelled tensions among its members, particularly between China, where COVID-19 cases were first identified in Wuhan in late 2019, and the United States.