ADDIS ABABA, Dec. 9 (Xinhua) -- The Ethiopian government and the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) have signed a cooperation agreement to strengthen strategic collaboration pertaining to refugees and Ethiopian returnees.

The memorandum of understanding agreement (MOU), which was signed between the Ethiopian Refugees and Returnees Service (RRS) and UNICEF, envisaged strengthening the two sides' collaboration in protecting and supporting refugees and Ethiopian returnees in the country, according to a joint press statement issued late Friday.

KORCZOWA, Poland (AP) — Pickup trucks and tourniquets bound for Ukraine’s battlefield are among items stuck in a mileslong line at the border with Poland. Components to build drones to fight off Russian forces are facing weeks of delays.

MOSCOW, December 9. /TASS/: Kiev is in talks on getting various Western-made warplanes, Ukrainian Defense Minister Rustem Umerov said.

UNITED NATIONS, Dec. 8 (Xinhua) -- The United States on Friday vetoed a UN Security Council resolution demanding immediate humanitarian ceasefire in Gaza.

The resolution, drafted by the United Arab Emirates and backed by more than 100 countries, gained support from 13 of the 15 Security Council members, with Britain abstaining.

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres had invoked Article 99 of the UN Charter to urge the organization's most powerful body to call for a ceasefire.

RIO DE JANEIRO, Dec 9 (NNN-CMA) – Brazil is expected to yield 306.2 million tonnes of grains, cereals and legumes in the 2024 harvest, 3.2 percent less than the expected output in 2023, the state-run Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics (IBGE), reported.

According to IBGE forecasts, Brazil’s 2023 harvest will reach a record 316.3 million tonnes, 20.2 percent more than last year.

This year’s cultivated area will reach 77.8 million hectares, or 6.3 percent more than that in 2022.

UNITED NATIONS (AP) — The United States vetoed a United Nations resolution Friday backed by almost all other Security Council members and dozens of other nations demanding an immediate humanitarian cease-fire in Gaza. Supporters called it a terrible day and warned of more civilian deaths and destruction as the war goes into its third month.

UNITED NATIONS, Dec 09 (APP): Denouncing Israel’s relentless attacks on the Palestinian people and civilian infrastructure in Gaza, Pakistan has called for holding the Israeli occupation forces accountable for war crimes in the besieged enclave.

“We strongly and unequivocally condemn the indiscriminate use of force by Israel,” Ambassador Muhammad Usman Iqbal Jadoon, acting permanent representative of Pakistan to the United Nations told the UN General Assembly on Friday.

RAMALLAH/GAZA, Dec. 9 (Xinhua) -- The Palestinian Authority and Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas) slammed on Saturday the U.S. veto on a UN Security Council (UNSC) resolution calling for an immediate humanitarian ceasefire in the Gaza Strip.

The resolution failed to pass at a Security Council emergency meeting held late Friday after the United States cast a veto and Britain abstained, while the other 13 UNSC members voted in favor of the proposal handed in by the UAE and backed by more than 90 UN member states.

MOSCOW, December 9. /TASS/: Russian Security Council Deputy Chairman Dmitry Medvedev called German Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s claims that Russia stopped gas supplies to Europe a lie.

"The German lies blatantly! They rejected [the gas supplies] themselves, they embarrassed themselves before their own people because of their hatred for Russia, and now they wriggle and lie," Medvedev said on his X page.

RAFAH, Gaza Strip (AP) — Israeli warplanes struck parts of the Gaza Strip in relentless bombardment Saturday, hitting some of the dwindling bits of land it had told Palestinians to evacuate to in the territory’s south.

The strikes came a day after the United States vetoed a United Nations resolution demanding an immediate humanitarian cease-fire in Gaza, despite its wide support. The vote in the 15-member Security Council was 13-1, with the United Kingdom abstaining.

BAGHDAD, Dec 9 (NNN-NINA) – Fourteen people were killed and 18 others injured, last night, in a fire that broke out at a residential building, in the town of Soran, in Erbil province, in Iraq’s semi-autonomous Kurdistan region.

A statement by the Soran health department said, “The fire first broke out on the third and fourth floors, which were inhabited by university students and teachers, and then spread to the entire five-storey building.”

TORONTO, Dec 9 (Reuters) - The dream of making it big in Canada is turning into a battle for survival for many immigrants due to the high cost of living and rental shortages, as rising emigration numbers hints to newcomers being forced to turn their back on a country that they chose to make their adopted home.

Trudeau has made immigration his main weapon to blunt Canada's big challenge of an aging and slowing population, and it has also helped fuel economic growth. That drove Canada's population up at its fastest clip in more than six decades this year, Statistics Canada said.