Switzerland

GENEVA (AP) — The head of the World Health Organization said Wednesday that the number of coronavirus deaths worldwide last week was the lowest reported in the pandemic since March 2020, marking what could be a turning point in the years-long global outbreak.

At a press briefing in Geneva, WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said the world has never been in a better position to stop COVID-19.

GENEVA, Sept 13 (NNN-AGENCIES) — Efforts to tackle AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria began to recover last year after being hit hard by the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, but the world is still not on track to defeat these killer diseases, according to a report.

In its 2022 report, the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria said the number of people reached with treatment and prevention efforts rebounded last year after declining for the first time in almost 20 years in 2020.

GENEVA, Sept 12 (NNN-AGENCIES) — Fifty million people around the world are trapped in forced labour or forced marriage, the UN said, warning that their ranks had swelled dramatically in recent years.

The United Nations had set a goal to eradicate all forms of modern slavery by 2030, but instead the number of people caught up in forced labour or forced marriage ballooned by 10 million between 2016 and 2021, according to a new report.

GENEVA, Sept 11 (NNN-AGENCIES) — Austrian lawyer Volker Türk has been appointed to succeed former two-time Chilean President Michelle Bachelet as United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, it was announced.

Türk’s appointment by UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres meant a diplomatic defeat for the government of Argentine, which had secretly endorsed the candidacy of Federico Villegas Beltrán in a move to capitalize on rivalries stemming from the conflictive global scenario, according to Buenos Aires media reports.

GENEVA, Sept 11 (NNN-AGENCIES) — The International Olympic Committee (IOC) Executive Board (EB) approved the creation of an Olympic Forest Network to step up the fight against climate change.

The project, inspired by the IOC’s Olympic Forest project set to plant around 590,000 native trees in Mali and Senegal, is an initiative driven by National Olympic Committees to create forest network in their own countries and regions.

The IOC announced its commitment to be climate positive in 2024 in alignment with the Paris Agreement on Climate Change in April 2021.

GENEVA, Sept 11 (Reuters) - Western countries face a dilemma as the U.N. Human Rights Council opens on Monday: confront China over human rights violations in its Xinjiang region and risk failing or miss the biggest opportunity to bring accountability in years.

A report by the U.N. rights office on Aug. 31 found that China's "arbitrary and discriminatory detention" of Uyghurs and other Muslims there may constitute crimes against humanity. China vigorously denies any abuse. 

ZANFLEURON PATH, Switzerland, Sept 11 (Reuters) - A rocky Alpine path between two glaciers in Switzerland is emerging for what the local ski resort says is the first time in at least 2,000 years after the hottest European summer on record.

The ski resort of Glacier 3000 in western Switzerland said this year's ice melt was around three times the 10-year average, meaning bare rock can now be seen between the Scex Rouge and the Zanfleuron glaciers at an altitude of 2,800 metres and the pass will be completely exposed by the end of this month.

GENEVA (AP) — The IOC approved its human rights strategy on Friday, completing a years-long process months after the Beijing Olympics brought scrutiny on how sports engage with a host nation’s record on discrimination and civil liberties.

The 50-page Olympic document guided by United Nations principles was also published one week after the outgoing U.N. human rights chief Michelle Bachelet released a report that said China’s detention of Uyghurs and other ethnic groups may be a crime against humanity.

GENEVA, Sept. 7 (Xinhua) -- Severe, long-lasting heatwaves and more frequent wildfires could lead to even worse air quality, an additional "climate penalty" for hundreds of millions of people, World Meteorological Organization (WMO) warned on Wednesday.

According to WMO's annual Air Quality and Climate Bulletin released on Wednesday, an anticipated rise in the frequency, intensity and duration of heatwaves and an associated increase in wildfires this century are likely to worsen air quality, harming human health and ecosystems.

GENEVA (AP) — The U.N. weather agency is predicting that the phenomenon known as La Nina is poised to last through the end of this year, a mysterious “triple dip” — the first this century — caused by three straight years of its effect on climate patterns like drought and flooding worldwide.

The World Meteorological Organization on Wednesday said La Nina conditions, which involve a large-scale cooling of ocean surface temperatures, have strengthened in the eastern and central equatorial Pacific with an increase in trade winds in recent weeks.