© UNICEF / Delil Souleiman
In the Al-Hol camp in northeastern Syria, more than 60,000 displaced people, most of them women and children, live in often dire conditions.
Syria: peace denied by a ‘deep pit of mistrust’
The grim ten-year milestone of the Syrian conflict, which has killed more than 350,000 people, has seen the United Nations Special Envoy for the country, Geir Pedersen, work tirelessly to advance the peace process, amid the scene he called “slow tsunami“Of crises, with economic collapse combined with COVID-19, corruption and mismanagement.
Several times a year, Mr. Pedersen offers his realistic assessment of the humanitarian and security situation in the country, which is characterized by what he calls “bay of distrust“Between warring parties, and frequent attacks on civilians.
Efforts to find an agreement on a new constitution for Syria began in October, but the Efforts are fruitless, at least for now. Mr. Pedersen acknowledged that the result was a disappointment but urged members of the Constitutional Committee to continue their work.
UNDP Yemen
The devastation caused by the protracted conflict in Yemen.
Yemen: ‘Knock on the door of hunger’
Desperate Yemenis face the highest level of acute malnutrition since the start of the conflict in 2015, with more than half of the population facing severe food shortages. . The head of the United Nations’ food aid agency David Beasley warned in March that millions of people were “Famine knocks on the door“.
The spring saw a significant deterioration in the conflict, with fighting expanding on several fronts, and the UN confirming that the country remained The world’s worst humanitarian crisis.
A new UN envoy on Yemen, Hans Grundberg, was appointed in September, under no illusions about the difficulty of bringing peace and stability to the country, as a UNICEF report shows that about 10,000 children have been killed or massacred since the start of the fighting.
Is there any real hope for the end of the war? Yes, the United Nations Development Program says (UNDP), released a report in November showed that, if the warring parties could agree to cease fighting, extreme poverty could be eradicated within a generation.
UNOCHA / Fariba Housaini
Children displaced from their homes in Kandahar province, Afghanistan.
Afghanistan: Taliban takeover
International attention turned to Afghanistan following the startlingly rapid military victory of the Taliban, who overran the capital Kabul in August after most international troops withdrew in June.
The Taliban takeover has been preceded by a marked increase in violence: Especially gruesome is bomb of an all-girls school in Kabul in May, killing at least 60 students, including several female students.
The following month, 10 demining officers from the HALO trust were killed in the northern region, in an attack description is equal to Security Council is “ferocious and cowardly”, and report published in July found that more women and children were killed and wounded in Afghanistan in the first half of 2021 than in the first six months of the year since records began in 2009.
As it became clear that the Taliban had become the de facto ruler of Afghanistan, the focus of the United Nations shifted to ensuring that humanitarian assistance remained as strong as possible: millions of people face starvation as the season approaches Winter begins and aid flights to Kabul resume in September. In December, the World Food Program (WFP) urge countries put politics aside and step up support to avert a potential disaster.
FAO / Michael Tewelde
The UN is providing US$20 million in CERF to mitigate livelihood losses and reduce food consumption after erratic rainfall in parts of Ethiopia dried up water supplies.
‘Uncertainty in the Grave’ in Ethiopia
The area north of Tigray is the focus of fighting in Ethiopia, between Government troops and regional forces of the Tigray People’s Liberation Front.
The unrest exacerbated humanitarian concerns: in February there were reports of people being displaced due to violence. reduce eating leaves to exist. By June, WFP estimates that about 350,000 people are at risk of going hungry.
There are ongoing reports of human rights abuses in Tigray, including disturbing News civilian abuse, and aid workers are being targeted. Three Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) employees were killed in June, and in July senior UN officials called for immediate and unrestricted humanitarian access to Tigray, and put an end to deadly attacks on aid workers.
However, the violence continued to escalate and the country was placed in a state of emergency in November, when the United Nations rights office shared report people of Tigrayan origin were rounded up and arrested in the capital, Addis Ababa and elsewhere.
United Nations political chief, Rosemary Di Carlo, told the Security Council that the country’s future is currently shrouded in “severe uncertainty”, and is affecting the stability of the entire Horn of Africa region.
OCHA / P. Peron
An displaced child in Kachin State, Myanmar.
Myanmar: a challenge to regional stability
The decision by Myanmar’s military to arrest the country’s top political leaders and government officials in a coup, including State Counselor Aung San Suu Kyi and President Win Myint, has been disproved. United Nations condemns. Secretary General António Guterres in February.
This was followed by a state of emergency, and a violent, widespread crackdown on dissent. However, protests against the takeover increased in February, resulting in the killing of several protesters.
UN Special Envoy for Myanmar Christine Schraner Burgener, alert that the situation at home is a challenge to the stability of the region.
In the months that followed, protests continued, violence against protesters escalated, and senior United Nations officials condemned the military’s actions. A United Nations report in April raised concerns that the coup, coupled with the impact of COVID-19, could leave 25 million people – nearly half the country’s population – living in poverty. in early 2022.
The UN calls for an urgent international response to prevent the crisis from turning into a disaster for the entire Southeast Asia region but, by September, the strength of the army seems to have become entrenched. In December, the United Nations rights office alert that the country’s human rights situation is deteriorating at an unprecedented rate.
MINUSMA / Gema Cortes
A UN peacekeeper patrols a village in Bandiagara in Mopti, Mali.
Mali: the dangerous region that keeps the peace
UN-backed efforts to make peace in Mali, following a military coup in 2020, cannot prevent a worsening security crisis in 2021.
The country, in Africa’s Sahel region, retains its position as the world’s most dangerous place for UN peacekeepers and sadly many of them have paid the ultimate price. while performing its obligations.
The first deadly attacks on the United Nations’ blue helmets took place in January 14, when four were killed and five wounded, and another attack killed another peacekeeper just two days later.
The following month, a temporary base of operations for the United Nations Integrated Stabilization Mission in Mali (MINUSMA) in Kerena, near Douentza, Central Mali was attacked, resulting in the death of one peacekeeper and the injury of 27 others.
In April, the head of the United Nations peacekeeping force, Jean-Pierre Lacroix, warned that green helmets, and the Malian Security and Defense Forces, continued to suffer attacks. repeat and significant losses, while some major towns are under constant threat from armed groups.
The death toll continues to rise: attacks in October and November left two peacekeepers dead while, in December, 7 people were killed and 3 seriously injured when their car collided with an improvised explosive device in the Bandiagara region. To date, more than 200 peacekeepers have been killed in Mali.
However, their presence in the country remains much-needed: some 400,000 people have been forced from their homes due to the conflict, and around 4.7 million people are relying on some form of humanitarian aid.
