Noon briefing of 13 November 2025

HIGHLIGHTS OF THE NOON BRIEFING BY STÉPHANE DUJARRIC

SPOKESPERSON FOR SECRETARY-GENERAL ANTÓNIO GUTERRES

THURSDAY, 13 NOVEMBER 2025

DEPUTY SECRETARY-GENERAL 

The Deputy Secretary-General, Amina Mohammed, is traveling to Kigali, Rwanda to participate in the Second Edition of the African Renaissance Retreat. 

This retreat will bring together some of Africa’s most prominent leaders from business, government and development to help shape and accelerate the continent’s transformation. 

During her visit, the Deputy Secretary-General will be meeting with senior government officials to discuss advancing the implementation of Agenda 2030 and the African Union’s Agenda 2063. The Deputy Secretary-General will also speak at the African School of Governance - a pan-African institution shaping the next generation of policymakers.  

She is expected to return back to New York on Monday. 

HEALTH/COP30  

At COP30 today, it is Health Day. In his remarks at the Health and Climate Ministerial Meeting, Simon Stiell, the UN Climate Change Executive Secretary, noted that in a big city like Belém, in the Amazon, we are reminded of the deep connection between human health and the health of our planet, and of our shared responsibility to take care of both. Mr. Stiell underscored that today’s launch of the Belém Health Action Plan is a vital step forward. Led by the Government of Brazil and the World Health Organization, it integrates adaptation, equity, and climate justice, the three pillars of a resilient society. 

As the world faces record-breaking temperatures, an Extreme Heat Risk Governance Framework and Toolkit was launched today at COP30, and that toolkit was launched to help countries strengthen governance, coordination, and investment in response to escalating heat risks. The new Framework and Toolkit were developed by an international collaboration of national and global experts, led jointly by the World Meteorological Organization (WMO), the UN Office for Disaster Risk Reduction (UNDRR), the Global Heat Health Information Network (GHHIN), and Duke University in the United States. It responds to the Secretary-General's Call to Action on Extreme Heat.  

WMO points out that extreme heat claims more than half a million lives every year and has resulted in a record 639 billion potential work hours lost in 2024.  

REFUGEES/COP30  

And for its part, the UN Refugee Agency, launched today the Refugee Environmental Protection (REP) Fund, the world’s first large-scale, refugee-driven carbon finance initiative. The Fund will support reforestation, cleaner cooking and green jobs that link environmental recovery with sustainable livelihoods and protection outcomes.  

The Fund’s first projects, launching in Uganda and Rwanda, mark the first step toward the initiative’s 10-year goal of restoring more than 100,000 hectares of land and expanding clean energy access to 1 million people. The Fund is also already exploring opportunities to expand its work in both Brazil and Bangladesh.  

UNHCR notes that across refugee-hosting nations, almost 25 million trees are cut down each year for cooking fuel. This deforestation weakens soil, worsens floods and droughts and makes farming less productive.    

FOOD WASTE/COP30  

Also today, the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) and its partners launched an initiative to cut food waste in half by 2030 and cut up to seven per cent of methane emissions as part of efforts to slow climate change. UNEP notes that the world wastes more than one billion tonnes of food every year, contributing up to 10 per cent of global greenhouse gas emissions. It accounts for up to 14 per cent of methane emissions, which is a short-lived climate pollutant that is 84 times more potent at warming the atmosphere than carbon dioxide over 20 years. Funded by the Global Environment Facility, the UN Environment Programme will launch a $3 million, four-year global project to implement the targets of the Food Waste Breakthrough.                                

OCCUPIED PALESTINIAN TERRITORY 

Turning to the situation in the Occupied Palestinian Territory. Since the latest ceasefire, our colleagues at OCHA (Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs) have been leading a number of assessments across Gaza to areas where people are living or have moved, including those who are in close proximity to the so-called “Yellow Line,” where as you know Israeli ground forces remain present.  

Our teams note that communities in these areas urgently need aid, and it is essential that services are restored quickly. These assessments will inform a rapid response by ourselves and our partners to the most critical needs, which include water, food, shelter, hygiene supplies, and healthcare.  

As winter takes hold, our partners working on shelter distributed thousands of tarpaulins, blankets, mattresses and clothing kits to vulnerable people across Gaza. That was done on Monday.  

Our partners are reporting important progress in improving healthcare, with 27 health service points reopened or newly established across Gaza since the latest ceasefire came into effect.  

However, as we’ve warned many times, multiple impediments are still restricting our ability to scale up the response as quickly and efficiently as we have the capacity to do. Once again, we underscore the need to open additional crossings, to resolve bottlenecks, fully facilitate the operations of humanitarian agencies, and provide safety guarantees for our convoys.  

Our partners working to support water, sanitation, and hygiene note that various equipment needed to improve critical infrastructure and address the public health risks remain blocked by Israeli authorities from entering Gaza. Such equipment includes machines that are urgently needed to contain and properly dispose of medical waste.  

Not having such equipment inside Gaza, as you can imagine, increases public health risks and contributes to the already dire sanitary and hygiene situation across Gaza.  

Regarding the West Bank, I can tell you that we are deeply disturbed by the attack by Israeli settlers who set fire overnight to a mosque in a West Bank village. Such attacks on places of worship are completely unacceptable. We have and will continue to condemn attacks by Israeli settlers on Palestinians and their property in the West Bank. Israel, as the occupying power, has a responsibility to protect the civilian population and ensure that those responsible for these attacks, including this attack on a mosque and the spray painting of horrendous language on a mosque, be brought to account.   

SUDAN 

Turning to Sudan and the increasingly dire situation there, the World Food Programme (WFP) warn that more than 21 million people, that’s 45 per cent of the entire population in Sudan, are now facing acute food insecurity after more than two and a half years of this conflict. 

As you well know, famine has been confirmed in El Fasher and Kadugli, both largely cut off from aid. However, in nine other locations where WFP has maintained consistent access, famine-like conditions have been reversed thanks to sustained assistance. 

WFP stresses that where conflict has eased and humanitarian operations have expanded, hunger has declined, showing that consistent access is the difference between starvation and actual recovery.  

The agency is currently reaching over four million people each month with emergency food, cash and nutrition support, including in previously hard-to-reach areas across Darfur, Kordofan, Khartoum and Al Jazira states. 

With more resources, WFP could double its reach to eight million people monthly and further reduce the risk of famine spreading into the hardest-hit areas. But without additional support, this fragile progress could quickly be undone. 

We join the World Food Programme in urging the international community to continue stepping up, with the support and funding needed to help people in Sudan who so desperately need help. 

SOMALIA

From Somalia, the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs inform us that severe drought in the country is putting millions of people’s lives at risk, with humanitarian aid severely limited due to dwindling funding. This week, the Government declared a nationwide drought emergency. The drought is particularly severe in the eastern and northern regions, but it is spreading to central and south Somalia as well.  

Our colleagues tell us that approximately 3.4 million people in Somalia are currently experiencing high levels of acute food insecurity, with more than 620,000 of them facing emergency levels of food insecurity. Between October and December of this year, more than 1 in 5 people in Somalia, this is at least 4.4 million men, women and children, are projected to face high levels of food insecurity.                                                                                          

The nutrition situation is equally alarming, with 1.9 million children under the age of five expected to suffer from acute malnutrition between August of this year and July of next year.  

Our humanitarian colleagues say that the new Government drought declaration calls on humanitarian agencies to scale up life-saving efforts in the areas of nutrition, health, water, and food security. The appeal comes as aid organizations have been forced to reduce or suspend emergency assistance due to crippling funding shortfalls. The $1.4 billion Humanitarian Needs and Response Plan is only 22 per cent funded, with $317 million in the bank so far.  

Our colleagues warn that, as a result, the number of people receiving emergency food aid will drop sharply, from 1.1 million in August to 350,000 only this month.     

This means that less than one in ten people who need food assistance for survival will receive aid. Again, we urge donors to give and to give generously to our humanitarian appeals.

AU-UN ANNUAL CONFERENCE 

And just for the record, I wanted to note that yesterday afternoon, the Secretary-General and Mahmoud Ali Youssouf, the Chairperson of the African Union Commission spoke to you, at the conclusion of the 9th African Union–United Nations annual conference. 

The Secretary-General said our collaboration with the African Union has never been stronger or more necessary, adding that since the start of his mandate. he has taken steps to keep the African continent high on the UN agenda. 

A closer strategic alliance with the AU Union was at the centre of this work, he said, building on shared values, mutual respect, common interests, and complementarity. 

Turning to climate, and as he prepares to return to Belém, the Secretary-General reiterated that developed countries have a moral imperative to act.   

By closing the climate ambition gap to keep the 1.5 degrees limit within reach, and by doubling adaptation finance to at least 40 billion dollars this year and massively scaling up adaptation finance in the years to come.  

EVENT TO MARK 20 YEARS OF UNDSS

Tomorrow, 14 November, at 10 a.m., there will be an event to mark the 20th anniversary of the United Nations Department of Safety and Security (UNDSS)

This event will bring together Member States, senior United Nations officials, and civil society to reflect, through testimonials, video stories, and interactive discussion, on the evolution of the United Nations’ approach to security: what has worked, what is changing, and what the future holds.You can watch live on UN Web TV.

**Briefing 

Philippe Lazzarini, the Commissioner-General of UNRWA (United Nations Relief and Works Agency), briefed reporters following his presentation at the General Assembly`s  Fourth Committee earlier in the day.