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Global hunger numbers rose to as many as 828 million in 2021: UN report 

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(Last Updated On: July 7, 2022)

Almost 828 million were affected by hunger globally in 2021, a new United Nations report found, highlighting fresh evidence that the world is moving backwards in its fight to end hunger, food insecurity, and malnutrition.

The new report entitled The State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World (SOFI) found that the number of people suffering from hunger globally increased by almost 46 million since 2020, when the COVID-19 pandemic wreaked havoc on the global economy, and 150 million more since 2019.

The report outlined updates on the global state of food security and nutrition, the latest estimates of the cost and affordability of a healthy diet, and the ways in which governments can repurpose their current support to the agricultural industry and make healthy food cheaper.

Approximately 2.3 billion people (29.3 percent) were moderately or severely food insecure in 2021 – 350 million more compared to before the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. Almost 924 million people faced food insecurity at severe levels, accounting for an increase of 207 million in just two years.

Speaking at the SOFI launch in New York on Thursday, Deputy Secretary-General Amina Mohammed said that the report’s figures were a “shocking report card of our efforts to end hunger.”

“These are people whose lives, livelihoods and prospects for a fruitful and dignified life are being crippled, with their future eroded and potential aspirations held back,” she added.

Almost 3.1 billion could not afford a healthy diet in 2020, up 112 million from the year before the pandemic, reflecting the economic impacts of the pandemic, such as inflation, and the measures put in place to mitigate the spread of the virus.

Particularly worrying was the fact that an estimated 45 million children under the age of five were suffering from wasting – the deadliest form of malnutrition which involves changes in the way one’s body uses proteins, carbohydrates and fat, leading to involuntary weight loss and muscle mass. Wasting increases the risk of death by up to 12 times, the UN said.

“They need our crosscutting resolve. The evidence presented in this report is compelling as it is outrageous when we see that children in rural settings and poorer households, whose mothers received no formal education, were even more vulnerable to stunting and wasting,” Mohammed said.

The global organization also reported that another 149 million children under the age of five had stunted growth and development due to the lack of essential nutrients in their diet, while 39 million were reported to be overweight.

“These are depressing figures for humanity,” said President of the International Fund for Agricultural Development Gilbert Houngbo.

“We continue to move away from our goal of ending hunger by 2030. The ripple effects of the global food crisis will most likely worsen the outcome again next year. We need a more intense approach to end hunger and IFAD stands ready to do its part by scaling up its operations and impact.”

Ukraine war, climate change are major drivers

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, which began on February 24 this year, caused immense disruption to the supply of staple cereals, oilseeds, and fertilizer from both nations and global supply chains, the report stated.

This disruption has led to soaring food prices and worsened the state of food insecurity.

Extreme climate events, within the context of this disruption during the Ukraine war, has only made matters worse in low-income countries.

“This report repeatedly highlights the intensification of these major drivers of food insecurity and malnutrition: Conflict, climate extremes, and economic shocks, combined with growing inequalities,” the heads of the five UN agencies involved in the report wrote.

“The issue at stake is not whether adversities will continue to occur or not, but how we must take bolder action to build resilience against future shocks.”

World Food Program chief David Beasley said the “real danger” was that these figures were likely to increase “in the months ahead,” resulting in: “Global destabilization, starvation, and mass migration on an unprecedented scale. We have to act today to avert this looming catastrophe.”

The report urged governments to take immediate action, suggesting they repurpose the resources being used to incentivize production, supply, and consumption of nutritious foods in order to make healthy foods more affordable and to reduce trade barriers to help lower the price of nutritious foods.

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Russia says evidence links attackers to ‘Ukrainian nationalists’

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(Last Updated On: March 28, 2024)

Russian investigators said on Thursday they had uncovered evidence that the gunmen who killed more than 140 people in an attack on a concert hall near Moscow last week were linked to “Ukrainian nationalists”.

Russia has said from the outset that it is pursuing a Ukrainian link to the attack, even though Kyiv has denied it and the militant group Islamic State (Daesh) has claimed responsibility.

In a statement, the state Investigative Committee said for the first time that it had uncovered evidence of a Ukrainian link, Reuters reported.

“As a result of working with detained terrorists, studying the technical devices seized from them, and analyzing information about financial transactions, evidence was obtained of their connection with Ukrainian nationalists,” the statement said.

However, the White House has described Russia’s allegation that Ukraine was involved in the attack as “nonsense”.

National security spokesman John Kirby said it was clear that ISIS was “solely responsible.”

He added the US passed a written warning of an extremist attack to Russian security services, one of many provided in advance to Moscow.

Russia says however it is suspicious that Washington was able to name the alleged perpetrator of the attack so soon after it took place.

The head of Russia’s FSB security service said earlier this week, again without providing evidence, that he believed Ukraine, along with the U.S. and Britain, were involved.

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Spain air drops 26 tonnes of humanitarian aid to Gaza

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(Last Updated On: March 28, 2024)

Spanish military planes air dropped 26 tonnes of humanitarian aid to Palestinians in the besieged Gaza Strip on Wednesday and Madrid called on Israel to open land border crossings to prevent a famine, the Foreign Ministry said.

The operation, carried out in coordination with Jordan and co-financed by the European Union, dropped more than 11,000 food rations to alleviate the “catastrophic levels of food insecurity” faced by up to 1.1 million people in Gaza, the ministry said in a statement.

“Spain insists on the opening of the land crossings as an indispensable measure to avoid a famine situation,” it added.

Other Western countries, including the United States, France and Germany, have also resorted to air drops to deliver aid to ease the humanitarian crisis in Gaza after nearly six months of war between Israeli forces and Hamas militants, Reuters reported.

Aid agencies say deliveries into Gaza, much of which has been laid to waste by Israeli bombardments, have been held up by bureaucratic obstacles and insecurity since the start of the war on Oct. 7, 2023.

Last week, a U.N.-backed report said a famine was imminent and likely to occur by May in northern Gaza and could spread across the enclave by July.

The Spanish foreign ministry also reaffirmed its commitment to supporting UNRWA, the United Nations humanitarian agency for Palestinians, and to its continued existence.

In January, major donors to UNRWA, including the U.S. and Germany, suspended funding following allegations that around 12 of its tens of thousands of Palestinian employees were suspected of involvement in the attacks on Israel by Hamas which triggered the war.

Israel says it puts no limit on the amount of humanitarian aid entering Gaza and blames problems in it reaching civilians there on U.N. agencies, which it says are inefficient, read the report.

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UN expert says Israel has committed genocide in Gaza, calls for arms embargo

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(Last Updated On: March 27, 2024)

A United Nations expert told the global body’s Human Rights Council on Tuesday that she believed that Israel’s military campaign in Gaza since Oct. 7 amounted to genocide and called on countries to immediately impose sanctions and an arms embargo, Reuters reported.

Israel, which did not attend the session, rejected her findings.

“It is my solemn duty to report on the worst of what humanity is capable of and to present my findings,” Francesca Albanese, the U.N. Special Rapporteur on human rights in the Occupied Territories, told the U.N. rights body in Geneva, presenting a report called “The Anatomy of a Genocide”.

“I find that there are reasonable grounds to believe that the threshold indicating the commission of the crime of genocide against Palestinians as a group in Gaza has been met,” she said, citing more than 30,000 Palestinians killed among other acts.

“I implore member states to abide by their obligations, which start with imposing an arms embargo and sanctions on Israel and so ensure that the future does not continue to repeat itself,” she said, prompting a burst of applause.

The 1948 Genocide Convention, enacted in the wake of the mass murder of Jews in the Nazi Holocaust, defines genocide as “acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group”.

Israel’s diplomatic mission in Geneva said the use of the word genocide was “outrageous” and said the war was against Islamist group Hamas and not Palestinian civilians. It was triggered when Hamas fighters stormed into southern Israel, killing 1,200 and taking 253 hostages, by Israeli tallies, read the report.

“Instead of seeking the truth, this Special Rapporteur tries to fit weak arguments to her distorted and obscene inversion of reality,” it said.

Gulf nations such as Qatar, as well as African countries including Algeria and Mauritania, voiced support for Albanese’s findings and alarm at the humanitarian situation, Reuters reported.

The seats for Israel’s ally the United States were left empty. Washington has previously accused the council of a chronic anti-Israel bias.

Albanese, an Italian lawyer, is one of dozens of independent human rights experts mandated by the United Nations to report and advise on specific themes and crises. Her views do not reflect those of the global body as a whole.

In the past, her comments on the Israel-Hamas conflict have drawn scrutiny, including from a U.S. ambassador in Geneva who said she has a history of using “antisemitic tropes”.

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