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Fannie Munlin, the chair of the NGO Executive Committee, the liaison between the civil society world and the UN. She manages the needs and demands of 1,600 nongovernmental organizations, including their egos. It seems to come easily to her. DULCIE LEIMBACH
Fannie Munlin has led a...
The International Court of Justice held hearings in December 2019 in a new case filed by The Gambia accusing Myanmar of genocide against the Rohingya people. Aung San Suu Kyi, Myanmar’s civilian leader, defended her country in the hearings. Now, the court is expected to issue a ruling on...
A detail from a mural being painted on a memorial for victims of Guatemala’s civil war, San Juan Comalapa, 2018. As UN-led global commemorations push ahead on women’s rights and equality in 2020, a set of six “action coalition” themes was announced by UN Women. Not everyone is happy with the...
In 2017, a contingent of UN peacekeepers in Haiti holding a closing ceremony to their operations and the start of peacekeepers’ overall withdrawal from the country that year. New research focusing on how sexual exploitation and abuse by peacekeepers in Haiti has affected women and girls there...
This year, the status of women on many fronts, from political involvement to personal justice, will be evaluated in international forums. It is widely recognized, for starters, that women in poor countries need more access to information on basic health care for themselves and their families....
President Trump, with Vice President Pence, White House advisers and military personnel, speaking on Jan. 8, 2020, about Iran’s missile strikes against Iraqi military bases housing US troops, days after Trump ordered the killing of Iran’s Maj. Gen. Qassim Suleimani. Much of the current crisis,...
Hicham Alaoui was a Moroccan prince who left the monarchy as an adult and is now an outspoken advocate for reform in Morocco, working from his academic base in the United States. In a wide-ranging interview, he delves into his break from the monarchy as well as the failures of the Arab Spring...
Secretary-General António Guterres arriving at the Security Council meeting on upholding the United Nations Charter, Jan. 9, 2020. The debate was scheduled long before the recent US-Iran attacks, but those alarming actions were referred to directly or alluded to by member states as...
Ambassador Dang Dinh Quy of Vietnam, speaking to media on Jan. 2, 2020, as his country assumes the rotating presidency of the UN Security Council in its first month as an elected member. In the Council, it plans to ally with another current Southeast Asian member, Indonesia.
With tensions...
A UN Development Program workshop on gender and disaster-risk reduction related to climate change, Cambodia, August 2019. In an essay, an expert on the UN development system says it “cries out for reform” but is stuck in inertia. MANUTH BUTH/UNDP CAMBODIA
GENEVA — Like his predecessors,...
Mitch McConnell, US Senate majority leader, with a fellow Kentuckian, Jennifer Yue Barber, whom President Trump intends to nominate as the US envoy to the United Nations Economic and Social Council. A lawyer who speaks Cantonese, she has no foreign service experience. MITCH MCCONNELL PRESS...
President Trump speaking at the UN’s luncheon for heads of state, September 2019. He and other certain global leaders attending the General Assembly opening session signaled the rise of nationalism coupled with pushback on women’s rights. LIZ MUZI/UNCA POOL
Once again, 2019 marked...
The female ice-hockey team of South Koreans and others of Korean descent, before North Koreans joined the team. It didn’t win a single game in the 2018 Winter Olympics, but that didn’t matter. PHOTO BY SUSIE JO
“A Team of Their Own: How an International Sisterhood Made Olympic History,”...
A street scene in Kabul, taken by the author, who is originally from Boston but worked for many years in Afghanistan. A Christmas she spent in the capital one year, she writes, was the most touching and surprising she had ever experienced.
The Christmas spirit finally found me drinking...
Rosemary DiCarlo, the UN Under Secretary-General for Political and Peacebuilding Affairs, in her office in the Secretariat building, New York, December 2019. DiCarlo, who is from Rhode Island in the United States, is the first person to lead the new department. JOE PENNEY
This year was a...
A refugee with the documents he needs to go from Greece into what is now called North Macedonia, 2015. Over the next two years, scores of countries will conduct censuses, and they will need to include migration data. That collection of information will be difficult but essential for societies to...
In the UN Security Council on Dec. 19, Vassily Nebenzia, the Russian ambassador, spoke about the Iran nuclear deal. To his right is Joanne Wronecka, Poland’s ambassador. Russia delayed two separate votes on dueling Syrian cross-border humanitarian-aid resolutions that day. The next day, Russia...
People from South Sudan’s Gumbo-Sherikat neighborhood in the capital of Juba meet in a UN-led gathering to build peace, after the signing of the 2018 agreement to end the country’s civil war. So far, the pact has not been carried out, but the author describes another potential path to peace for...
Greta Thunberg, center, the Swedish teenage activist, arriving at the UN’s climate conference in Madrid, Dec. 6, 2019. A new poll asking US adults and teens about climate science found respondents more seriously concerned about global warming than in the past, but more than a third blamed the “...
The Netherlands hosted a conference with governments and the financial sector on human trafficking and slavery, June 2019. Sexual extortion, or “sextortion,” the author says, is a crime against humanity that is not only part of human trafficking transactions but is also found in other arenas of...
Rosemary DiCarlo, the highest-ranking US official at the UN, is the first person to lead the newly created Department of Political and Peacebuilding Affairs. Being the first woman in the post, she said, is a “heavy burden,” as she acts as a model for aspiring men and women at the organization....
The UNA-USA shop in Palo Alto, Calif., is run by a local UNA chapter. Its success in selling artisanal goods from mostly the developing world is not only due to the products’ uniqueness and quality but also because the store is operated by volunteers. DULCIE LEIMBACH
What: The small and...
Kelly Knight Craft, the US envoy to the UN, leads the Security Council in December. She said she wanted to restore “credibility” to the Council. MARK GARTEN/UN PHOTO
GLASGOW, Kentucky — “There’s no place like home for the holidays” is the United States’ theme for the Security Council...
As human-rights protections slip worldwide, the authors argue that the Inter-Parliamentary Union, in a group photo, October 2019, above, can establish a “critical link between international agreements and domestic progress on human-rights issues.”
As protection of human rights seems to be...
The chorus of New York City’s Public School 22 performing at the General Assembly celebration marking the 30th anniversary of the adoption of the Convention on the Rights of the Child, Nov. 29, 2019. The US and five other countries that make up the bulk of dues to the UN general budget are...
Rafael Mariano Grossi, an Argentine who was heavily backed by the US, becomes the new director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency on Dec. 2. He faces many internal and external pressures, including Iran’s uranium enrichment activities. DEAN CALMA/IAEA
VIENNA,...
President Trump with UN Deputy Secretary-General Amina Mohammed, at the 74th session of the General Assembly, Sept. 24, 2019. Melania Trump is in the center. The US is blocking progress on women’s reproductive rights globally. ARIANA LINDQUIST/UN PHOTO
It did not take long after the 74th ...
Rohingya-displaced Muslims in a Bangladesh refugee camp. A new case filed by The Gambia with the International Court of Justice accuses Myanmar of genocide against the Rohingya. This is the first time that rape will be included in such a case prosecuted at The Hague court.
The recent...
Marie Yovanovitch, the former American ambassador to Ukraine who testified in the US impeachment hearings recently, was attacked in her testimony in real time by President Trump on Twitter. He attacked a female White House adviser, also on Twitter.
Although the first hearings by the...
At Château 49, a classic crême caramel for dessert beckons on the three-course $25 prix-fixe lunch in this low-key but pleasant French bistro near the United Nations. IRWIN ARIEFF
Second Avenue near the United Nations is not exactly expense-account row, which makes Château 49 something of...
One of the most popular activities at the Russian-African summit in Sochi in late October was trying out the virtual reality booth with Russian rifles. President Putin wants investments and closer friendships in Africa, while the United States takes a back seat. JOE PENNEY
African summits...
Nikki Haley, at the State Department, June 19, 2018, as the United States announced its withdrawal from the Human Rights Council. The reviewer of her new book says that it “brims with love for the commander in chief” and that she brags about her advice to him.
“With All Due Respect:...
Kelly Knight Craft speaks to the media after her first day in the UN Security Council as US ambassador, Sept. 12, 2019. As her country assumes the rotating presidency of the Council in December, Knight Craft is planning a Council trip to her home state of Kentucky. ESKINDER DEBEBE
While...
China’s foreign minister, Wang Yi, in a UN Security Council meeting, Sept. 25, 2019. China’s rising economic clout globally is playing out in the UN on human-rights matters, most recently on the persecution of the Muslim Uighurs in China. MANUEL ELIAS/UN PHOTO
Twenty-three nations,...
At the Nairobi summit marking the 25th anniversary of the International Conference on Population Development, a session focusing on indigenous women and girls featured Tarcila Rivera Zea Chirapaq of Chirapaq, a nonprofit group in Lima, Peru.
NAIROBI, Kenya — More than 6,000 delegates in...
The intensifying controversy over decriminalizing “sex work” has prompted the head of UN Women to declare its neutrality on the subject, possibly further enflaming the dispute as preparations marking women’s rights begin for 2020. CREATIVE COMMONS
The surprising controversy over women in...
The 35th Association of Southeast Asian Nations summit opening ceremony, Nov. 3, 2019. To help Rohingya refugees to return to Myanmar and rebuild their lives, the author of this essay urges Asean leaders to work more heartedly on gaining trust among the affected parties.
At the 33d...
Ambassador Karen Pierce of Britain in the Security Council with Riyad Mansour, center, Palestine’s envoy to the UN, May 15, 2018. Britain’s theme for its Council presidency is the effects of conflict on ordinary people, not a controversial issue. ESKINDER DEBEBE/UN PHOTO
While Britain...
Refugees, above, from the territory of Western Sahara have been living in Tindouf, Algeria, for decades. Western Sahara is the last colonial outpost in Africa, now occupied by Morocco. Former US National Security Adviser John Bolton tried to resolve the situation, but his departure from the...
Scenes from a UN women, peace and security in Mali event, with Margot Wallstrom, Sweden’s foreign minister, one of the speakers, Oct. 22, 2015. Wallstrom, who created the world’s first feminist foreign policy, has left the Swedish ministry after five whirlwind years. Her “political engagement,”...
William vanden Heuvel, a former US envoy to the UN, helped set up the Franklin Roosevelt International Disability Rights Award, among the many roles he has played in his life related to the world body. Here, he awards the prize to Queen Sofía of Spain on behalf of her country, Sept. 9, 2013. ...
The airline industry accounts for 2 percent of global carbon emissions, and the UN predicts that travel will more than triple in the next 30 years. Biofuel use is one way to reduce emissions, but the industry says that it is a costly alternative and needs outside investments. PHOTOSFORCLASS...
President Putin’s first Russia-Africa summit, held in the Black Sea city of Sochi this month, showcased Russian-made weapons and other goods and services. As for the big picture, the summit projected Russia’s intent to return as an influencer in Africa, building on Soviet-era alliances there....
In the cyclone-hit city of Beira, Mozambique, the World Food Program springs into action, 2019. A new external survey of the agency’s workplace found a range of grievances, including sexual harassment. DEBORAH NGUYEN/WFP
The World Food Program may be receiving millions of more donations...
Tulsi Gabbard, a Democratic candidate for US president, in Concord, N.H., Feb. 16, 2019. The US representative from Hawaii has announced she is not running for re-election in Congress. She has also been sparring with Hillary Clinton recently. CREATIVE COMMONS
Tulsi Gabbard, the United...
The flag of the self-declared Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus, embedded in the mountains, can be seen from everywhere in Nicosia, the capital of the Republic of Cyprus. It is a stark reminder of the Mediterranean island’s division for the last 55 years. CREATIVE COMMONS
Anywhere from...
Vassily Nebenzia, Russia’s top diplomat to the UN, briefing the media, Oct. 16, 2019. Russia and Iran have been vigorously protesting US visa denials to dozens of their diplomats. Our new podcast episode explains their strategy. LOEY FELIPE/UN PHOTO
While Turkey has carried out its plan...
A UN peacekeeper at a memorial in Khiam, in south Lebanon, where four UN soldiers were killed by Israeli bombers, using American-made weapons, during the 2006 war between Hezbollah and Israel. A new US-based project will gather in one place global research on successful peace-building work....
A new free dedicated hotline in Britain for women to report sexual harassment at work has been inundated with calls from women of all ages, suggesting the problem may be pervasive.
A new hotline is offering free, confidential legal advice to women in England and Wales who...
Vershinin Vasilievich, deputy foreign minister of Russia, chairs a Security Council meeting on Syria, Sept. 30, 2019. Behind him is Vassily Nebenzia, Russia’s ambassador to the UN. Russia and Iran are delaying certain General Assembly committee meetings, including on disarmament, to protest the...
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