June 2024

After months of delays, four hundred Kenyan security officers arrived in Haiti this week as part of a contingent of international police forces sent to quell rampant gang violence in the Caribbean nation. Last October, a United Nations Security Council resolution authorized a Multinational Security Support (MSS) mission to help the Haitian National Police combat violence and restore peace in the largely gang-ruled country.

The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) has warned that South Sudan is facing a "perfect storm" of ongoing violence, imminent flooding, economic crisis, underfunding of the humanitarian response, and an influx of new arrivals due to the war in neighboring Sudan. The warning comes as 9 million people in the country are in need of humanitarian assistance. Among those in need are 4.9 million children.

Alarming new food security projections for Sudan released on Thursday show that the country is facing a devastating hunger catastrophe on a scale not seen since the Darfur crisis in the early 2000s, the heads of three United Nations agencies have warned. New data shows that more than 750,000 people are experiencing catastrophic levels of food insecurity, with 25.6 million people at crisis levels of hunger and the threat of famine in several regions.

The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) says that halfway through 2024, only 18 percent - or US$8.8 billion - of the US$48.7 billion needed to help people in need around the world this year has been received. This is far less than at the same time last year, when there was already a massive shortfall. At the same time, more than 300 million people around the world are in urgent need of humanitarian assistance.

The latest analysis of acute food insecurity in the Gaza Strip concludes that as long as Israel's war on Gaza continues and humanitarian access is restricted by its military and political authorities, the risk of famine remains high throughout the territory. The Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) report on Gaza, released on Tuesday, paints a stark picture of ongoing hunger, finding that 96 percent of the population faces acute food insecurity at crisis level or worse, with nearly half a million people in catastrophic conditions.

United Nations officials have once again outlined the dire situation in Afghanistan, with more than 50 percent of the population - some 23.7 million people - in need of humanitarian assistance in 2024, the third-highest number of people in need in the world. Meanwhile, Afghanistan's de facto rulers, the Taliban, are touting a UN invitation to an international conference in Qatar later this month, which they see as a recognition of their government's growing global importance.

United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres has expressed his profound concerns about escalating violence and “bellicose rhetoric” between Israel and Hezbollah along the Blue Line, the demarcation between Israeli and Lebanese armed forces. He warned Friday that the risk of a wider conflict in the Middle East is real - and must be avoided. The warning comes as Lebanon is already facing a severe humanitarian crisis due to socio-economic shocks, ongoing political instability and spillover from the Syrian crisis.

Nearly 580,000 people, including 300,000 children, are internally displaced across Haiti, a 60 percent increase since March, according to the latest data from the International Organization for Migration (IOM). The UN agency says the rise is due to the deterioration of the security situation in the metropolitan area of Port-Au-Prince, the country's capital, particularly between the end of February and April. Haiti is now the country with the largest number of displacements globally due to crime-related violence.

Independent investigators appointed by the United Nations have accused Sudan's warring parties of driving the country into a humanitarian abyss by flagrantly disregarding basic human rights and international humanitarian law. The three-member International Fact-Finding Mission for Sudan presented its first oral update to the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva on Tuesday and Wednesday.

United Nations human rights chief Voker Türk has expressed dismay at the extent to which warring parties in many settings have overstepped the bounds of what is acceptable and legal, "trampling human rights at their core." Moreover, data collected by the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) shows that the number of civilian deaths in armed conflicts skyrocketed by 72 percent in 2023 compared to 2022.

In 2023, children living in situations of war and conflict experienced intolerable levels of violence, according to a new United Nations Secretary-General's report on children and armed conflict released this week. Children were recruited and used, including on the front lines, attacked in their homes, abducted on their way to school, their schools used for military purposes, their doctors targeted, and the horrific list goes on.

Amid the alarming humanitarian situation in Sudan, the UN Security Council on Thursday demanded that the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) end their siege of the North Darfur capital, El Fasher, as they move to take the last remaining town in the Western Darfur region from the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF). Meanwhile, the humanitarian emergency remains severely underfunded, despite the United States pledging US$315 million in additional funding to Sudan on Friday.

The United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR) reports that forced displacement around the world has reached historic highs, driven by conflict, persecution, human rights abuses, the climate crisis and other events disturbing public order. In a report released on Thursday, UNHCR said the number of forcibly displaced people continued to rise this year and now stands at 120 million.

Israeli government and military authorities are responsible for war crimes and crimes against humanity committed during military operations and attacks in Gaza since October 7, 2023, the United Nations Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, and Israel said in a report released Wednesday. The Commission also found that Palestinian non-state armed groups are responsible for war crimes committed in Israel.

At least 49 migrants, refugees and asylum seekers have died, and 140 others are missing after a boat capsized off the coast of Yemen. The boat carrying 260 people - Somalis and Ethiopians - sank on Monday near Alghareef Point in Yemen's Shabwah governorate. Among those who lost their lives in the tragedy are 31 women and six children, according to the International Organization for Migration (IOM).

While negotiations for a comprehensive cease-fire and hostage deal in the Gaza Strip are reportedly underway between Israel and the Palestinian armed group Hamas, a US-led proposal has not been officially accepted by either side. At the same time, the carnage and humanitarian catastrophe on the ground continues as the war entered its ninth month, with people dying across Gaza from Israeli attacks, starvation, or lack of basic resources.

The lives of more than 35 million people in the Sahel region are being affected by a complex and interdependent pattern of crises, exacerbated by deteriorating security, political instability, and the effects of climate change, leaving them in urgent need of humanitarian assistance and protection. UN agencies warn that lives will be at risk if aid organizations are not given the resources they need to respond to these crises and help the region's most vulnerable people.

Many of the hundreds of thousands of refugees and migrants from sub-Saharan Africa who seek protection, asylum or work in Europe each year are "at great risk of harm and death" because few protection services are available to help them on their perilous journeys, according to a report released this week by the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR).

Acute food insecurity is set to increase in scale and severity in 18 hunger hotspots, a new United Nations early warning report said on Wednesday. The report highlights the urgent need for humanitarian assistance to prevent famine in Gaza and Sudan, and further deterioration of the devastating hunger crises in Haiti, Mali and South Sudan. It also warns of the lingering effects of El Niño and the looming threat of La Niña, bringing more climate extremes that could disrupt livelihoods.

The United Nations says more than one million Palestinians have fled the southernmost town of Rafah in the Gaza Strip as Israeli attacks there continue despite a binding order from the International Court of Justice (ICJ) to halt the offensive in Rafah immediately. Meanwhile, the Israeli government is torpedoing its own proposal to achieve a full and complete ceasefire in Gaza as part of a deal that would secure the release of all hostages, offer a roadmap to end the war, and rush desperately needed humanitarian aid throughout Gaza.

United Nations officials say they are deeply concerned by the alarming deterioration of the humanitarian situation in the eastern province of North Kivu in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DR Congo, DRC). According to the UN humanitarian office (OCHA), clashes have resumed in several parts of the towns of Masisi, Rutshuru and Sake, while fighting is also moving closer to the town of Kanyabanyonga.

Time is running out for millions of people in Sudan who are "at imminent risk of famine" because the country's warring parties are preventing aid from reaching them, major aid agencies warn. Nineteen global humanitarian organizations, including twelve United Nations agencies, urged Sudan's warring parties on Friday to stop blocking food aid from reaching millions of people suffering from acute hunger.