United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres speaks at the opening ceremony of the ninth Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) Summit, at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, China, on September 5, 2024.
| Photo Credit: Reuters

United Nations (UN) Secretary-General Antonio Guterres told African leaders on Thursday (September 5, 2024) that “injustices” against the continent must be corrected, calling for the region to have a permanent seat on the UN Security Council.

“Mr. Guterres and more than 50 African leaders are attending this week’s China-Africa forum,” according to state media. Addressing the forum, Mr. Guterres told the leaders that it was time to correct “historic injustices” against the continent.

“It is outrageous… that the continent of Africa still has no permanent seat on the Security Council,” he said. “Many African countries are mired in debt and struggling to invest in sustainable development,” he said.

“Many have no access to effective debt relief, scarce resources, and clearly insufficient… funding,” he added. Mr. Guterres told the gathering that “China’s remarkable record of development — including on eradicating poverty — provides a wealth of experience and expertise”. “It can be a catalyst for key transitions on food systems and digital connectivity,” he said.

“And as home to some of the world’s most dynamic economies, Africa can maximise the potential of China’s support in areas from trade to data management, finance and technology,” Mr. Guterres added.

“Yoga has roots in India and is now embraced globally, uniting people with its values of balance, mindfulness and peace,” United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has said.

In his message on the 10th International Yoga Day, Mr. Guterres urged people to be inspired by the ancient practice’s timeless values and its call for a more peaceful and harmonious future.

In December 2014, the UN proclaimed June 21 as the International Day of Yoga, recognising its universal appeal. The draft UN General Assembly resolution establishing the International Day of Yoga was proposed by India and endorsed by a record 175 member states.

“The International Day of Yoga recognises the ancient practice’s unmatched power to deliver healing, inner peace and physical, spiritual and mental well-being,” Mr. Guterres said in his message on June 21 as the world celebrated the 10th International Yoga Day.

“With roots in India but now embraced worldwide by people of all faiths and cultures, Yoga unites people with its values of balance, mindfulness and peace with people and planet alike,” Mr. Guterres said in the message posted on X by the Permanent Mission of India to the UN.

He noted that this year’s theme ‘Yoga for Self and Society’ reminds “us of Yoga’s important role in enhancing people’s lives and the wider community. On this important day, let us all be inspired by Yoga’s timeless values and its call for a more peaceful and harmonious future,” the UN chief said.

The Permanent Mission of India to the UN organised the commemoration of the 10th International Yoga Day at the North Lawn Area of the UN Headquarters, where Prime Minister Narendra Modi led the Yoga Day last year in a historic celebration, nine years after he proposed from the UN General Assembly podium for June 21 to be marked as International Yoga Day.

The event was attended by UN envoys, personnel, officials and members of the diaspora as well as yoga enthusiasts and practitioners. UN Deputy Secretary-General Amina Mohammed greeted the attendees with a ‘Namaste’ and said that at its heart, yoga is about unity, the unity of mind, body and spirit.

“It is about you, it is about me, it is about us. And at the UN today, we see how it unites people across cultures and countries,” she said.

Ms. Mohammed added that since the UN General Assembly declared June 21 as the International Day of Yoga 10 years ago, the celebration and momentum have grown steadily.

“Today, it brings millions of us together of all ages and diverse backgrounds to honour this ancient tradition,” Ms. Mohammed said as she referred to the Guinness World Record created at last year’s Yoga Day commemoration for most nationalities practising Yoga together. At least 135 countries were represented at the 2023 Yoga session.

“And I was the proud one of those many. That achievement was a wonderful and powerful symbol of Yoga’s global popularity, its universal appeal, and its power to bring people together in their shared interests and their shared humanity,” she said.

Extending greetings for the day with a ‘Namaste’, President of the 78th session of the UN General Assembly Dennis Francis said in a virtual message that Yoga has been an integral part of India’s cultural tradition for millennia.

“Over the years, it has spread through the currents of cultural diffusion to every corner of the world, with millions of practitioners who turn to its mental, physical and spiritual benefits,” he said.

He said that Yoga’s benefits, such as a sense of contentment and happiness, physical strength and flexibility, mental fortitude, a sense of empathy and compassion, and inner peace, are all qualities that “should also guide our efforts on the multilateral stage.” Mr. Francis added that Yoga’s ethical guide to living advocates for nonviolence, truthfulness and contentment.

“These principles resonate deeply with the core values of the United Nations, which strive to promote peace, justice, and human dignity worldwide. I therefore see in Yoga a powerful metaphor for the United Nations itself,” he said.

Mr. Francis called on people to embrace the teachings of Yoga, not only as a physical practice but as a guiding philosophy for “our collective efforts in building a better, stronger future for all of humanity.”

Charge d’affaires and Deputy Permanent Representative of India to the UN Ambassador R. Ravindra said that in the decade since 2014, Yoga has been embraced by people across the globe like never before, and today it has become a symbol of overall well-being, health and peace.

On the occasion, the UN Chamber Music Society performed world music repertoire, and Yoga masters led meditation and Yoga exercises.

The United Nations’ (UN) top official in Afghanistan defended the failure to include Afghan women in the upcoming first meeting between the Taliban and envoys from 22 countries, insisting that demands for women’s rights are certain to be raised.

UN special envoy Roza Otunbayeva was pummelled with questions on June 21 from journalists about criticism from human rights organisations at the omission of Afghan women from the meeting in Qatar’s capital, Doha, on June 30 and July 1.

The Taliban seized power in 2021 as United States and NATO forces withdrew following two decades of war. No country officially recognises them as Afghanistan’s government, and the UN has said that recognition is almost impossible while bans on female education and employment remain in place.

Human Rights Watch Executive Director Tirana Hassan said that, in the face of the Taliban’s tightening repression of women and girls, the UN plans to hold a meeting “without women’s rights on the agenda or Afghan women in the room are shocking.”

Amnesty International Secretary General Agnes Callamard said, “The credibility of this meeting will be in tatters if it doesn’t adequately address the human rights crisis in Afghanistan and fails to involve women human rights defenders and other relevant stakeholders from Afghan civil society.”

Ms. Otunbayeva, a former president and Foreign Minister of Kyrgyzstan, insisted after briefing the United Nations Security Council that “nobody dictated” conditions to the United Nations about the Doha meeting, but she confirmed that no Afghan women will be present.

“UN political chief Rosemary DiCarlo will chair the meeting,” Ms. Otunbayeva said. She will attend and a few of the 22 special envoys on Afghanistan who are women will also be there.

The meeting is the third UN-sponsored gathering on the Afghan crisis in Doha. The Taliban weren’t invited to the first and Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said they set unacceptable conditions for attending the second in February, including demands that Afghan civil society members be excluded from the talks and that they be treated as the country’s legitimate rulers.

Undersecretary-General DiCarlo visited Afghanistan in May and invited the Taliban Foreign Minister, Amir Khan Muttaqi, to attend the upcoming meeting. The Taliban accepted and said they are sending a delegation.

“We do hope that delegation will be led by de facto Foreign Minister Muttaqi,” Ms. Otunbayeva said, but the Taliban may send another Minister.

“Just before the Doha gathering, there will be a hybrid meeting with Afghan civil society representatives from inside and outside the country,” Ms. Otunbayeva said. And on July 2, immediately after Doha, “we’ll be meeting all the civil society people.”

The Taliban have used their interpretation of Islamic law to bar girls from education beyond age 11, ban women from public spaces, exclude them from many jobs, and enforce dress codes and male guardianship requirements.

Ms. Otunbayeva said the upcoming gathering will be the first face-to-face meeting between the Taliban and the envoys and will focus on what she said were “the most important acute issues of today” — private business and banking, and counter-narcotics policy.

Both are about women, she said, and the envoys will tell the Taliban, “Look, it doesn’t work like this. We should have women around the table. We should provide them also access to businesses.” She added that “if there are, let’s say, five million addicted people in Afghanistan, more than 30% are women.”

Ms. Otunbayeva told the Security Council the UN hopes the envoys and the Taliban delegation will speak to each other, recognise the need to engage, and “agree on next steps to alleviate the uncertainties that face the Afghan people.”

The UN expects a continuation of the dialogue at a fourth Doha meeting later in the year focused on another key issue: the impact of climate change on the country.

Lisa Doughten, the UN humanitarian office’s finance director, told the council that “the particularly acute effects of climate change” are deepening Afghanistan’s humanitarian crisis, saying more than 50% of the population — some 23.7 million people — need humanitarian aid this year, the third-highest number in the world.

“Extreme weather events are more frequent and more intense,” she said. “Some areas in Afghanistan have warmed at twice the global average since 1950” with the country experiencing increasing droughts and deadly flash flooding.

Ms. Otunbayeva said another outcome from the Doha meeting that the UN would like to see is the creation of working groups to continue talks on how to help farmers replace poppies producing opium with other crops, how to provide pharmacies with medication to help addicted people, and how to address crime and improve banking and private businesses.

As for what the UN would like to see, she said, “we need badly that they will change their minds and let girls go to school.” Ms. Otunbayeva said Afghanistan is the only country in the 57-nation Organisation of Islamic Cooperation that doesn’t let girls go to school, which she called “a big puzzle.” “Afghanistan has been very male-dominated and “we want to change the minds” of young people from such a traditional society towards women,” Ms. Otunbayeva said.

The humanitarian office’s Doughten told the council “the ban on girls’ education is fueling an increase in child marriage and early childbearing, with dire physical, emotional and economic consequences.” She also cited reports that attempted suicides by women and girls are increasing.

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres met Kuwait’s Deputy Foreign Minister Jarrah Jaber Al-Ahmad Al-Sabah at Kuwait international airport in Kuwait City.
| Photo Credit: AFP

U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on My 12 appealed for an immediate halt to the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza, the return of hostages and a “surge” in humanitarian aid to the besieged Palestinian territory.

“I repeat my call, the world’s call for an immediate humanitarian ceasefire, the unconditional release of all hostages and an immediate surge in humanitarian aid,” Mr. Guterres said in a video address to an international donors’ conference in Kuwait. “But a ceasefire will only be the start. It will be a long road back from the devastation and trauma of this war,” he added.

Israeli strikes on Gaza continued on May 12 after it expanded an evacuation order for Rafah despite international outcry over its military incursion into eastern areas of the city, effectively shutting a key aid crossing.

“The war in Gaza is causing horrific human suffering, devastating lives, tearing families apart and rendering huge numbers of people homeless, hungry and traumatised,” Mr. Guterres said.

His remarks were played at the opening of the conference in Kuwait organised by the International Islamic Charitable Organization (IICO) and the UN’s humanitarian coordination organisation OCHA.

On May 10, in Nairobi, the UN head warned Gaza faced an “epic humanitarian disaster” if Israel launched a full-scale ground operation in Rafah.

Gaza’s bloodiest-ever war began following Hamas’ unprecedented October 7 attack on Israel that resulted in the deaths of more than 1,170 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally of Israeli official figures.

Vowing to destroy Hamas, Israel launched a retaliatory offensive that has killed more than 34,971 people in Gaza, mostly women and children, according to the Hamas-run territory’s health ministry.

Iran is carrying out executions “at an alarming rate,” putting to death at least 419 people in the first seven months of the year, the United Nations chief said in a new report. That’s a 30% increase from the same period in 2022.

Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said in the report to the U.N. General Assembly on the human rights situation in Iran that seven men were executed in relation to or for participating in nationwide protests, sparked by the September 2022 death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini, who was picked up by the morality police for her allegedly loose headscarf in violation of Iran’s Islamic dress code.

In all seven cases, information received by the U.N. human rights office “consistently indicated that the judicial proceedings did not fulfil the requirements for due process and a fair trial under international human rights law,” Mr. Guterres said.

“Access to adequate and timely legal representation was frequently denied, with reports of coerced confessions, which may have been obtained as a result of torture.”

He said 239 people — more than half of those executed in the seven-month period — were reportedly put to death for drug-related offenses, a 98% increase from the same period last year.

Mr. Guterres expressed deep concern “at the lack of transparent and independent investigations into reported human rights violations, in particular in the context of the latest nationwide protests.” He said the continued targeting of lawyers is also impeding accountability for past and ongoing violations.

The secretary-general cited information received by the U.N. rights agency that between September 17, 2022, and February 8, 2023, an estimated 20,000 individuals were arrested for participating in the protests.

“It is particularly concerning that most of the individuals arrested may have been children, given that the reported average age of those arrested was estimated to be 15 years, according to the deputy commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps,” he said.

The government said “a minimum of” 22,000 people arrested during the protests were pardoned, but the secretary-general said it was difficult to verify the arrest and release numbers.

Mr. Guterres expressed concern that a number of individuals who were pardoned then received summonses on new charges or were rearrested, including women activists, journalists and members of minority groups. He cited reported instances of disproportionate and excessive use of force against protesters, and beatings and sexual violence after they were put in detention, as well as psychological abuse.

According to information received by the Office of the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, three renowned female actors who appeared unveiled in public — Azadeh Samadi, Afsaneh Bayegan and Leila Bolukat — were convicted for not covering their hair, Mr. Guterres said. They were handed a range of sentences, “including imprisonment from 10 months to two years, attending weekly counseling sessions, carrying out hospital cleaning duties, a two-year driving prohibition and providing a ‘certificate of healthiness’ upon completion,” he said.

The report circulated Tuesday, covering the year-long period ending July 31, said “the continued denial of adequate medical care in detention remains a serious concern.”

Reports indicate that the health of German-Iranian rights activist Nahid Taghavi, 69, who is serving a sentence of seven years and six months in the notorious Evin prison after conviction on national security charges, “has significantly deteriorated in prison,” the U.N. chief said.

On other human rights issues, Guterres said Iranian authorities continue to use national security “to justify restrictions on the right to freedom of opinion and expression, online and offline.”

He cited a June 27 speech by Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei calling on the judiciary to “eliminate dissenting voices” online and tighten control over cyberspace.

Among many recommendations, the secretary-general urged Iran to immediately halt all executions, abolish the death penalty and release all people detained arbitrarily, “including women and girls, human rights defenders, lawyers and journalists, for legitimately exercising their rights to freedom of opinion and expression, association and peaceful assembly.”

He also urged the government to guarantee the right to peaceful assembly, to ensure that security at protests complies with international human rights norms and standards, and to respect the rights to due process and fair trials.

United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres speaks to the media personnel as Nepal’s Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal, also known as Prachanda, listens to him outside the Office of the Prime Minister and Council of Ministers at Singha Durbar in Kathmandu, Nepal October 29, 2023.
| Photo Credit: Reuters

U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Sunday called on Nepal Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal ‘Prachanda’ after arriving here on first official visit to the Himalayan nation.

Mr. Guterres also held separate meetings with the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Defence Purna Bahadur Khadka and Foreign Minister Narayan Prakash Saud.

In a post on X, Nepal’s Prime Minister’s office said a meeting was held between PM Prachanda and Mr. Guterres, who is here on an official visit to Nepal at the friendly invitation of the Prime Minister.

Mr. Guterres said that the transitional justice process in Nepal that the government is trying to conclude must help bring peace to victims, families and communities.

Addressing the media after meeting Prime Minister Prachanda, the U.N. chief pledged the world body’s support to Nepal to develop a process that meets international standards, the Supreme Court’s rulings, and the needs of victims — and to put it into practice, My Republica newspaper reported.

In a joint press briefing with Prime Minister Prachanda, the U.N. chief urged developed countries to increase support to countries like Nepal that are hard-hit by the impacts of climate change.

“Nepal is also caught in a blizzard of global crises not of its making: the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic, inflation, and the enormous threat posed by climate chaos,” he said.

He said that much more international action is needed. The developed countries must step up to support sustainable development, and help developing economies, including Nepal, to tackle the climate crisis, he said.

Mr. Guterres arrived here in the wee hours of Sunday on a four-day official visit. He was received by Foreign Minister Saud and senior Foreign Ministry officials at the Tribhuvan International Airport.

The U.N. chief was accorded a ceremonial welcome at the airport, said a statement issued by the Foreign Ministry.

The U.N. chief is accompanied by Under-Secretary-General for Peace Operations, Jean Pierre Lacroix, Resident Coordinator of the United Nations to Nepal Hanaa Singer-Hamdy and other officials from the U.N. Headquarters in New York and the United Nations country team in Nepal.

Mr. Guterres, who is visiting Nepal for the first time after assuming the U.N. Secretary-General post in 2017, will discuss with Nepal’s top leadership the matters relating to the peace process, sustainable development and climate change with Nepali authorities, the foreign ministry said earlier.

Starting in 2006, the peace process for inclusion of Maoist rebels in mainstream politics, issues relating to the implementation of transitional justice mechanism and truth and reconciliation commission, remains incomplete.

Mr. Guterres is scheduled to meet President Ramchandra Paudel later on Sunday.

The Secretary-General will have separate meetings with Nepali Congress President Sher Bahadur Deuba and Communist Party of Nepal (Unified Marxist–Leninist) (CPN-UML) Chairperson K.P. Sharma Oli.

He will also visit the Patan Durbar Square, a heritage site of historical and archaeological significance.

PM Prachanda will host a banquet reception on Sunday evening in honour of the Secretary-General.

The Secretary-General will also visit famous tourist destinations Namche, Pokhara, Annapurna Base Camp and Buddha’s birthplace Lumbini on Monday.

He would address a joint session of Nepal’s Parliament on Tuesday.

Eminent technology experts hailing from India have been named to a new global advisory body announced by UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres to support the international community’s efforts to govern artificial intelligence.

The High-Level Multistakeholder Advisory Body on Artificial Intelligence, announced by the UN Chief here on October 26, brings together experts from the government, the private sector, the research community, civil society, and academia, and is focused on building a global scientific consensus on risks and challenges, helping harness AI for the Sustainable Development Goals, and strengthening international cooperation on AI governance, a statement said.

Among the members of the advisory body are the Secretary-General’s Envoy on Technology Amandeep Singh Gill; co-founder of iSPIRT Foundation, a non-profit technology think tank that has conceptualised India Stack, Health Stack, and other digital public goods Sharad Sharma and Lead Researcher at Hugging Face, India Nazneen Rajani.

Addressing reporters here, Mr. Guterres said “In our challenging times, AI could power extraordinary progress for humanity.

“From predicting and addressing crises to rolling out public health services and education services, AI could scale up and amplify the work of governments, civil society and the United Nations across the board,” he said.

Mr. Guterres noted that for developing economies, AI offers the possibility of leapfrogging outdated technologies and bringing services directly to people where needs are bigger and for the people who need them most.

Before he was appointed the Secretary General’s Envoy on Technology, Mr. Gill was the CEO of the International Digital Health and Artificial Intelligence Research Collaborative (I-DAIR) project, based at the Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies, Geneva.

Previously, he was the Executive Director and Co-Lead of the United Nations Secretary-General’s High-Level Panel on Digital Cooperation (2018-2019).

Mr. Gill was India’s Ambassador and Permanent Representative to the Conference on Disarmament in Geneva (2016-2018).

Mr. Sharma also co-founded Teltier Technologies, a wireless infrastructure startup now part of CISCO. An active angel investor with over two dozen investments, he was instrumental in the success of India’s first IP-focused fund, the India Innovation Fund. He is a member of the National Startup Advisory Council, Securities and Exchange Board of India’s (SEBI) Financial and Regulatory Technology Committee and chairs the International Financial Services Centres Authority’s (IFSCA) Expert Committee on Asset Tokenization and the Taskforce on Digital Public Infrastructure in the ThinkTank20 (T20) group of G20.

Ms. Rajani is the Research Lead at Hugging Face, specialising in AI Safety and Alignment, leveraging Reinforcement Learning with Human Feedback (RLHF). She is recognised as an expert and thought leader in Large Language Models (LLMs) robustness and evaluation. Before her tenure at HuggingFace, Ms. Nazneen successfully led a team of esteemed researchers at Salesforce Research, dedicated to developing robust natural language generation systems built upon LLMs, according to her profile.

Ms. Rajani earned her Doctorate in Computer Science from the University of Texas at Austin, where her research focused on Natural Language Processing (NLP) and the interpretability of Machine Learning models.

She has over 40 publications in premier conferences and her research has garnered significant attention from prominent media outlets.

Other members of the advisory body include President of the Patrick J. McGovern Foundation, U.S. Vilas Dhar; President and Founder of Eurasia Group Ian Bremmer; Special Advisor to the Minister of Justice and Public Security, Federal Government of Brazil Estela Aranha; Secretary of State for Digitalisation and Artificial Intelligence of Spain Carme Artigas; Chief Innovation Officer and Deputy Director General at Clalit Health Services Israel Ran Balicer; Aerospace Coordinator of the German Federal Government Anna Christmann; Chief Responsible AI Officer at Microsoft Natasha Crampton and Associate Professor at the University of Tokyo Arisa Ema.

Mr. Guterres said the transformative potential of AI for good is difficult even to grasp. “And we are in urgent need of this enabler and accelerator,” he said.

He noted that many countries are already reeling from the impact of the climate crisis. The 2030 Agenda – our global blueprint for peace and prosperity on a healthy planet – is in deep trouble.

“AI could help to turn that around. It could supercharge climate action and efforts to achieve the 17 Sustainable Development Goals by 2030,” he said adding that all this depends on AI technologies being harnessed responsibly, and made accessible to all – including the developing countries that need them most.

He stressed that as things stand, AI expertise is concentrated in a handful of companies and countries, and this could deepen global inequalities and turn digital divides into chasms.

“The potential harms of AI extend to serious concerns over misinformation and disinformation; the entrenching of bias and discrimination; surveillance and invasion of privacy; fraud, and other violations of human rights,” Mr. Guterres said.

He said without entering into a host of doomsday scenarios, it is already clear that the malicious use of AI could undermine trust in institutions, weaken social cohesion, and threaten democracy itself.

“For all these reasons, I have called for a global, multidisciplinary, multistakeholder conversation on the governance of AI so that its benefits to humanity – all of humanity – are maximized, and the risks contained are diminished,” he said adding that the new Advisory Body is the starting point for it.

The UN statement added that the formation of the AI Advisory Body marks a significant step in the United Nations’ efforts to address issues in the international governance of artificial intelligence.

The new initiative will foster a globally inclusive approach, drawing on the UN’s unique convening power as a universal and inclusive forum on critical challenges, it said.

The Body will help bridge other existing and emerging initiatives on AI governance, and issue preliminary recommendations by end-2023, with final recommendations by summer 2024, ahead of the Summit of the Future.

The United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees warned on October 25 that without immediate deliveries of fuel it will soon have to sharply cut back relief operations across the Gaza Strip, which has been blockaded and hit by devastating Israeli airstrikes since Hamas militants launched an attack on Israel more than two weeks ago.

The warning came as hospitals in Gaza struggled to treat masses of wounded with dwindling resources, and health officials in the Hamas-ruled territory said the death toll was soaring as Israeli jets continued striking the territory overnight into Wednesday.

The Israeli military said its strikes had killed militants and destroyed tunnels, command centres, weapons storehouses and other military targets, which it has accused Hamas of hiding among Gaza’s civilian population. Gaza-based militants have been launching unrelenting rocket barrages into Israel since the conflict started.

The Hamas-run Gaza Health Ministry said the airstrikes killed at least 704 people between Monday and Tuesday, mostly women and children. The Associated Press could not independently verify the death tolls cited by Hamas, which says it tallies figures from hospital directors.

The death toll was unprecedented in the decades-long Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Even greater loss of life could come when Israel launches an expected ground offensive aimed at crushing Hamas militants.

In Washington, White House National Security Council spokesman John Kirby told reporters the U.S. could not verify the one-day death toll. “The Ministry of Health is run by Hamas, and I think that all needs to be factored into anything that they put out publicly.”

Israel said on Tuesday it had launched 400 airstrikes over the past day, an increase from the 320 strikes the day before. The U.N. says about 1.4 million of Gaza’s 2.3 million residents are now internally displaced, with almost 6,00,000 crowded into U.N. shelters.

Gaza’s residents have been running out of food, water and medicine since Israel sealed off the territory following the attack on southern Israel by Hamas, which is sworn to Israel’s destruction.

In recent days, Israel allowed a small number of trucks filled with aid to come over the border with Egypt but barred deliveries of fuel — needed to power hospital generators — to keep it out of Hamas’ hands.

The U.N. said it had managed to deliver some of the aid in recent days to hospitals treating the wounded. But the U.N. agency for Palestinian refugees, the largest provider of humanitarian services in Gaza, said it was running out of fuel.

Officials said they were forced to reduce their operations as they rationed what little fuel they had.

“Without fuel our trucks cannot go around to further places in the strip for distribution,” said Lily Esposito, a spokesperson for the agency. “We will have to make decisions on what activities we keep or not with little fuel.”

Meanwhile, more than half of Gaza’s primary healthcare facilities, and roughly a third of its hospitals, have stopped functioning, the World Health Organization said.

Overwhelmed hospital staff struggled to triage cases as constant waves of wounded were brought in. The Health Ministry said many wounded are laid on the ground without even simple medical aid and others wait for days for surgeries because there are so many critical cases.

The Health Ministry says more than 5,700 Palestinians have been killed in the war, including some 2,300 minors. The figure includes the disputed toll from an explosion at a hospital last week.

The fighting has killed more than 1,400 people in Israel — mostly civilians slain during the initial Hamas attack, according to the Israeli government. Hamas is also holding some 222 people that it captured and brought back to Gaza.

The conflict threatened to spread across the region, as Israeli airstrikes hit Syrian military sites in the south on Wednesday, killing eight soldiers and wounding seven, according to Syria’s state-run SANA news agency.

The Israeli military said in a post on X, formerly known as Twitter, its jets had struck Syrian military infrastructure and mortar systems in response to rocket launches from Syria.

Israel has launched several strikes on Syria in recent days, including strikes that put the Damascus and Aleppo airports out of service, in an apparent attempt to prevent arms shipments from Iran to militant groups, including Lebanon’s Hezbollah. Israel has been fighting the Iranian-backed group Hezbollah across the Lebanese border in recent weeks.

Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah met on Wednesday with top Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad officials in their first reported meeting since the war started. Such a meeting could signal coordination between the groups, as Hezbollah officials warned Israel against launching a ground offensive in Gaza.

Israeli military spokesman Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari said Iran was helping Hamas, with intelligence and by “whipping up incitement against Israel across the world.” He said Iranian proxies were also operating against Israel from Iraq, Yemen and Lebanon. Fighting also erupted in the West Bank, which has seen a major spike in violence.

Islamic Jihad militants said they fought with Israeli forces in Jenin overnight. The Palestinian Health Ministry in the West Bank said Israel killed four Palestinians in Jenin, including a 15-year-old, and two others in other towns. That brought the total number of those killed in the occupied West Bank since October 7 to 102.

Across central and south Gaza, where Israel told civilians to take shelter, there were multiple scenes of rescuers pulling the dead and wounded out of large piles of rubble from collapsed buildings. Graphic photos and video shot by the AP showed rescuers unearthing bodies of children from multiple ruins.

A father knelt on the floor of the Al-Aqsa Hospital in Deir Al-Balah next to the bodies of three lifeless children cocooned in bloodied sheets. Later, at the nearby morgue, workers prayed over 24 dead wrapped in body bags, several of them the size of small children.

“Buildings that collapsed on residents killed dozens at a time in several cases, witnesses said. Two families lost 47 members in a levelled home in Rafah,” the Health Ministry said.

In Gaza City, at least 19 people were killed when an airstrike hit the house of the Bahloul family, according to survivors, who said dozens more remained buried. The legs of a dead woman and another person, both still half buried, dangled out of the wreckage where workers dug through the dirt, concrete and rebar.

Israeli Foreign Minister Eli Cohen told the U.N. Security Council on Tuesday that the proportionate response to the October 7 attack is “a total destruction” of the militants. “It is not only Israel’s right to destroy Hamas. It’s our duty,” he said.

On Wednesday, Israel’s U.N. ambassador, Gilad Erdan, said his country will stop issuing visas to U.N. personnel after U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said that Hamas’ attack “did not happen in a vacuum.” It was unclear what the action, if followed through with, would mean for U.N. aid personnel working in Gaza and the West Bank.

“It’s time to teach them a lesson,” Erdan told Army Radio, accusing the U.N. chief of justifying a slaughter.

The U.N. chief told the Security Council on Tuesday that “the Palestinian people have been subjected to 56 years of suffocating occupation.” Mr. Guterres also said “the grievances of the Palestinian people cannot justify the appalling attacks by Hamas. And those appalling attacks cannot justify the collective punishment of the Palestinian people.”

Trucks carrying aid wait to exit, on the Palestinian side of the border with Egypt, as the conflict between Israel and Palestinian Islamist group Hamas continues, in Rafah, in the southern Gaza Strip, on October 21, 2023.
| Photo Credit: Reuters

The border crossing between Egypt and Gaza opened on October 21 to let desperately needed aid flow to Palestinians for the first time since Israel sealed off the territory following Hamas’ bloody rampage two weeks ago.

Gaza’s 2.3 million Palestinians, half of whom have fled their homes, are rationing food and drinking filthy water. Hospitals say they are running low on medical supplies and fuel for emergency generators amid a territory-wide power blackout. Israel has launched waves of airstrikes across Gaza that have failed to stem ongoing Palestinian rocket fire into Israel.

The opening came after more than a week of high-level diplomacy by various mediators, including visits to the region by U.S. President Joe Biden and U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres. Israel had insisted that nothing would enter Gaza until some 200 people captured by Hamas were freed and the Palestinian side of the crossing had been shut down by Israeli airstrikes.

More than 200 trucks carrying roughly 3,000 tonnes of aid had been positioned near the crossing for days. But Egypt’s state-owned Al-Qahera news, which is close to security agencies, said just 20 trucks had crossed into Gaza on October 21. Hundreds of foreign passport holders also waited to cross from Gaza to Egypt to escape the conflict.

The Hamas-run government in Gaza said the limited convoy “will not be able to change the humanitarian catastrophe that Gaza is currently enduring,” calling for a secure corridor operating around the clock.

The opening came hours after Hamas released an American woman and her teenage daughter, the first captives to be freed after the militant group’s October 7 incursion into Israel. It was not immediately clear if there was any connection between the two.

Hamas released Judith Raanan and her 17-year-old daughter, Natalie, on Friday for what it said were humanitarian reasons in an agreement with Qatar, a Persian Gulf nation that has often served as a Mideast mediator.

“The two had been on a trip from their home in suburban Chicago to Israel to celebrate Jewish holidays,” the family said. They were in the kibbutz of Nahal Oz, near Gaza, when Hamas and other militants stormed into southern Israeli towns, killing hundreds and abducting 203 others.

Mr. Biden spoke with the two freed hostages and their relatives. The International Committee of the Red Cross, which transported the freed Americans to Israel, said their release was “a sliver of hope.”

Hamas said in a statement that it was working with mediators “to close the case” of hostages if security circumstances permit. The group said it is committed to mediation efforts by Egypt, Qatar and others.

There are growing expectations of a ground offensive that Israel says would be aimed at rooting out Hamas, an Islamic militant group that has ruled Gaza for 16 years. Israel said on Friday it does not plan to take long-term control over the small but densely-populated Palestinian territory.

Israel has also traded fire along its northern border with Lebanon’s Hezbollah militant group, raising concerns about a second front opening up. The Israeli military said on Saturday it struck Hezbollah targets in Lebanon in response to recent rocket launches and attacks with anti-tank missiles.

Israel issued a travel warning on Saturday, ordering its citizens to leave Egypt and Jordan — which made peace with it decades ago — and to avoid travel to a number of Arab and Muslim countries, including the United Arab Emirates, Morocco and Bahrain, which forged diplomatic ties with Israel in 2020. Protests against Israel’s actions in Gaza have erupted across the region.

A potential Israeli ground assault is likely to lead to a dramatic escalation in casualties on both sides in urban fighting. More than 1,400 people in Israel have been killed in the war — mostly civilians slain during the Hamas incursion. Palestinian militants have continued to launch unrelenting rocket attacks into Israel — more than 6,900 projectiles since October 7, according to Israel.

More than 4,100 people have been killed in Gaza, according to the Health Ministry run by Hamas. That includes a disputed number of people who died in a hospital explosion earlier this week.

Speaking on Friday about Israel’s long-term plans for Gaza, Defence Minister Yoav Gallant laid out a three-stage plan that seemed to suggest Israel did not intend to reoccupy the territory it left in 2005.

First, Israeli airstrikes and “maneuvering” — a presumed reference to a ground attack — would aim to root out Hamas. Next will come a lower intensity fight to defeat remaining pockets of resistance. And, finally, a new “security regime” will be created in Gaza along with “the removal of Israel’s responsibility for life in the Gaza Strip,” Mr. Gallant said.

Mr. Gallant did not say who Israel expected to run Gaza if Hamas is toppled or what the new security regime would entail.

Israel occupied Gaza from 1967 until 2005, when it pulled up settlements and withdrew soldiers. Two years later, Hamas took over. Some Israelis blame the withdrawal from Gaza for the five wars and countless smaller exchanges of fire since then.

Over a million people have been displaced in Gaza. Many heeded Israel’s orders to evacuate from north to south within the sealed-off enclave on the coast of the Mediterranean Sea. But Israel has continued to bomb areas in southern Gaza where Palestinians had been told to seek safety, and some appear to be going back to the north because of bombings and difficult living conditions in the south.

“Generators in Shifa Hospital, Gaza’s largest, were operating at the lowest setting to conserve fuel while providing power to vital departments such as intensive care, hospital director Mohammed Abu Selmia said. Others worked in darkness. The lack of medical supplies and water make it difficult to treat the mass of victims from the Israeli strikes,” he said.

The Palestine Red Crescent Society said it had received a threat from the Israeli military to bomb Al-Quds Hospital. It said Israel has demanded the immediate evacuation of the Gaza City hospital, which has more than 400 patients and thousands of displaced civilians who sought refuge on its grounds.

It was not clear if there was an agreement for generator fuel to be brought in through Rafah.

External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar meets António Guterres, U.N. Secretary General on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly session, in New York on September 26, 2023
| Photo Credit: ANI

External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar met with the top U.N. leadership here and discussed India’s G20 Presidency, regional issues and global challenges, sustainable development goals and Security Council reforms.

A day before he addresses the General Debate at the ongoing high-level United Nations General Assembly session, Mr. Jaishankar met with U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres and President of the 78th session of the General Assembly Dennis Francis on Monday at the headquarters of the world organisation.

He also met with the United Nations Development Programme Administrator Achim Steiner.

Mr. Jaishankar said it was a “pleasure” to meet with Mr. Guterres and that he discussed “how India’s G20 Presidency has contributed to strengthening” the U.N.’s sustainable development agenda.

“We have coordinated closely in this regard over the last year,” Mr. Jaishankar wrote on X, adding that he appreciated Mr. Guterres’ strong commitment to reforming international financial institutions.

In a readout of the meeting issued by the U.N. spokesperson’s office, Mr. Guterres “expressed appreciation for India’s cooperation with the U.N. and its leadership of the G20”.

Mr. Guterres and Mr. Jaishankar also “discussed the situations in Afghanistan, Myanmar, and other global challenges”, according to the readout.

The U.N. secretary-general attended the G20 Leaders’ Summit in New Delhi on September 9 and 10 held under India’s Presidency of the grouping.

Before his meeting with Mr. Guterres, Mr. Jaishankar met Mr. Francis and welcomed his appreciation of the outcomes of India’s G20 Presidency.

“Confident that it would contribute to the U.N. General Assembly’s discourse and deliberations. Agreed on the importance of reforming multilateralism and giving the Global South its due on crucial issues of our times,” Mr. Jaishankar said.

In a post on ‘X’, Mr. Francis said he was “delighted” to meet Mr. Jaishankar and congratulated him on India’s “successful G20 Chairmanship, especially on India’s unwavering advocacy in support of the Global South”.

Mr. Francis added that he discussed priorities and key issues of the 78th UNGA session, including UNSC reforms and building on the outcomes of the Sustainable Development Goals Summit held during the high-level week ahead of the Summit of the Future to be held in 2024.

Mr. Jaishankar also thanked Mr. Francis for his presence at the special ‘India-UN for Global South: Delivering for Development’ side event. The minister hosted the event in New York on Saturday.

In his meeting with Mr. Steiner, Mr. Jaishankar appreciated the UNDP’s engagement with India’s G20 Presidency initiatives. “Can work together to scale up Indian success stories for global benefit,” he said.

Mr. Jaishankar also met with the Foreign Minister of the UAE Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed Al Nahyan in New York.

“Always a pleasure to meet FM @ABZayed of UAE, this time in New York. Appreciate the rapid progress in our bilateral cooperation. Value our regular exchange of perspectives on regional and global issues,” he posted on ‘X’ later.

The external affairs minister said he had a “warm meeting with our SAGAR partner”, Minister for Foreign Affairs of Madagascar Yvette Sylla.

“Discussed development partnership, millets and rice production, digital delivery and defence cooperation,” he tweeted.