Monday, 16 February 2004
Listen to entire programme - Real Audio MP3

Listen to the news

UN Condemns Brutal Murder of De-Miners in Afghanistan

The top United Nations envoy in Afghanistan has expressed shock and outrage at the "brutal and cold-blooded" murder of four de-miners working to help eradicate landmines from Afghanistan. Senior envoy Jean Arnault said "the cowardly act committed against them cannot and will not be tolerated." He said that the perpetrators "who seek to destroy the hard earned peace, obstruct positive advances and callously wage war on decent and innocent people" must be brought to justice. The four de-miners were shot dead while travelling in vehicles from Herat to Farrah City. Spokesman Manoel de Almeida e Silva says Mr. Arnault had praise for the de-miners.

"He called them invisible heroes who without any thought of self, put their own lives at risk everyday."

UN Spokesman in Afghanistan Manoel de Almeida e Silva.

Children Increasingly Being Affected by Unrest in Haiti : UNICEF

The growing political crisis in Haiti is taking a heavy toll on families and communities. That according to the UN children's agency (UNICEF), which calls for the protection of children since, it says, they are increasingly affected by the violence. The agency says it is particularly alarmed at the fate of more than a million children who have already been identified as being especially vulnerable. A UN inter-agency mission to the country reports that Haiti's children are facing serious risks to their health, physical well-being and psychosocial welfare. And according to spokesman Damien Personnaz, UNICEF funding is running very low.

"And anytime we are asking for additional funding from the donor community including for this crisis or even in normal programmes we don't basically don't get more than 10 to 15 per cent of what is required, so Haiti as far as UNICEF is concerned is chronically under funded."

UNICEF is however providing emergency relief assistance to children in affected areas, including basic health and education kits.

Scientists Call for Swift Protection of Endangered Deep-Sea Corals

There's been a call for immediate action in protecting increasingly endangered deep- sea coral and sponge ecosystems. The call came in a statement from more than a thousand scientists on the sidelines of the UN Convention on Biological Diversity in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. The scientists representing nearly 70 countries expressed concern that the rate of destruction of marine ecosystems, especially through commercial fishing methods such as bottom trawling, was increasing at an alarming rate. The statement noted that in recent years, scientists have discovered deep-sea corals and coral reefs in numerous locations that are vital in research of marine life. The marine scientists urged the United Nations to establish a moratorium on bottom trawling on the high seas and called on individual Nations to ban bottom trawling to protect its deep-sea ecosystems.
The United Nations convention is a gathering of more than 2-thousand scientists, government officials and environmental groups.

Liberia Needs Help to Rebuild its Environment: UNEP

The UN Environment Programme (UNEP), has called for support in rebuilding Liberia's environment after 14 years of devastating conflict. A UNEP study said "the environmental challenges faced by Liberia cannot be addressed without financial, technical and logistical support of the international community." The study called for protection of forests and mine resources, cleaning up of ports and cities, restoring water and sanitation services, restoration of electricity as well as repairing of administrative structures responsible for the environment. UNEP Executive Director Klaus Toepfer said the war in Liberia has not only had a devastating impact on its people, but also on the country's natural resources and biodiversity.

UNHCR Reinforce Efforts to Move Sudanese Refugees Further into Chad

More supplies and staff are being sent to eastern Chad to reinforce efforts to move Sudanese refugees from the border to safer sites further inland. The UN refugee agency (UNHCR), says more than 4-thousand refugees have so far been moved to inland sites in a race against the start of the rainy season in late May. But Spokesman Ron Redmond says water is a major concern for the agency and its partners in eastern Chad where ground water reserves appear to be extremely limited.

"And if we don't find more sites with water, we are not going to be able to move these people because we don't hat to move them away from where they're at where there at least is some water to the sites inland until we are sure that there is enough water where we are taking them."

Redmond says the difficulty in finding sites with sufficient water to meet the needs of the refugees could slow down the relocation.