Under-Secretary-General Rosemary DiCarlo. File
| Photo Credit: Reuters

The United Nations (UN) political chief who will chair the first meeting between Afghanistan’s Taliban rulers and envoys from about 25 countries answered sharp criticism that Afghan women have been excluded, saying on June 26 that women’s rights will be raised at every session.

Undersecretary-General Rosemary DiCarlo stressed to a small group of reporters that the two-day meeting starting on Sunday is an initial engagement aimed at initiating a step-by-step process with the goal of seeing the Taliban “at peace with itself and its neighbours and adhering to international law,” the UN Charter and human rights.

This is the third UN meeting with Afghan envoys in Qatar’s capital, Doha, but the first that the Taliban are attending. They weren’t invited to the first and refused to attend the second. Other attendees include envoys from the European Union, the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation, the United States, Russia, China and several of Afghanistan’s neighbours, DiCarlo said.

The Taliban seized power in Afghanistan 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 and women can’t go out without a male guardian.

When Ms. DiCarlo met with senior Taliban officials in Kabul in May, she said she made clear that the international community is concerned about four things: the lack of an inclusive government, the denial of human rights especially for women and girls, and the need to combat terrorism and the narcotics trade.

“The issue of inclusive governance, women’s rights, human rights writ large, will be a part of every single session,” she said. “This is important, and we will hear it again and again, I’m sure from quite a number of us.”

Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International criticised the United Nations for not having Afghan women and civil society representatives at the table with the Taliban.

Ms. DiCarlo described the meeting as a process. “This is not an inter-Afghan dialogue,” she stressed. “I would hope we could get to that someday, but we’re not there.”

The Taliban’s Foreign Ministry on June 26 reiterated the concerns they want to raise — restrictions on Afghanistan’s financial and banking system, development of the private sector and countering drug trafficking. Ms. DiCarlo said they also raised Afghanistan’s vulnerability to climate change.

She said discussions on the first day of the Doha meeting on Sunday will focus on how the world would engage with the Taliban to achieve the objectives of peace and its adherence to international law and human rights.

The assessment calls for a step-by-step process, where each side would respond to actions taken by the other.

On the second day, the participants will discuss the private sector, including getting more women into the workforce through microfinance projects, as well as counter-narcotics efforts, such as alternative livelihoods and support for drug addicts, she said. “Hopefully, it will achieve some progress, but it will be slow,” Ms. DiCarlo said.

She stressed that the meeting isn’t about the Taliban and doesn’t signify any recognition of Afghan’s rulers as the country’s official government. “That’s not in the cards,” she said.

“This is about Afghanistan and the people and their need to feel a part of the international community and have the kinds of support and services and opportunities that others have — and they’re pretty blocked off right now,” Ms. DiCarlo said.

Before the meeting, the UN political chief met with the Afghan diaspora. After the meeting on Tuesday, she said the UN and the envoys will meet with civil society representatives including women, and private sector representatives mainly living in Afghanistan.

Brasilia:

Record floods that killed over 170 people and displaced half a million in southern Brazil are a warning sign of more disasters to come throughout the Americas because of climate change, an official at the United Nations’ refugee agency said on Tuesday.

Roughly 389,000 people in the state of Rio Grande do Sul remain displaced from their homes because of the intense rain and flooding, which local officials say was the worst disaster in the region’s history. Scientists say climate change made the flooding twice as likely to happen.

Andrew Harper, special advisor on climate action to the refugee agency UNHCR, visited a flooded neighborhood in state capital Porto Alegre over the weekend and called it “a ghost town.”

“It was underwater for almost 40 days. There wasn’t even any rats running around. Everything had died,” Harper said in an interview on Tuesday.

Even after the flood waters subsided, residents have not returned to the neighborhood where streets are piled high with water-logged garbage and debris. Many are still living in shelters, including Venezuelan refugees who had resettled in Porto Alegre.

UNHCR is helping the local government to build temporary housing.

Residents of some hard hit areas may never return, having been forced to move by repeated flooding, Harper said. But how many would become so-called climate migrants will only be known years after the disaster.

The floods surpassed all expectations that local authorities had for climate disasters, and governments need to do more to prepare for these events, Harper said.

“We’re seeing the emergence in Brazil of what we may be seeing throughout the Americas. So to ignore this, they do it at their own peril,” Harper said.

Governments need to understand where the people most vulnerable to climate change live, like the neighborhood he visited in Porto Alegre, and include those people in their climate plans, he said.

“It’s a warning signal, but we’ve been seeing warning signals now for five, ten years,” Harper added. “At what point do you basically have to slap somebody in the face and say, ‘Wake up, you’re not going to ignore this.'”

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

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.

United Nations Security Council unanimously adopts resolution renewing the mandate of UN Assistance Mission for Iraq (UNAMI) for a final 19-month period until 31 December 2025; all 15 members voted in favour.
| Photo Credit: Photo Credit: X/@UN_News_Centre

The United Nations Security Council (UNSC) voted unanimously on May 31 to end the United Nations (UN) political mission in Iraq established in 2003 following the United States-led invasion that toppled Saddam Hussein to coordinate post-conflict humanitarian and reconstruction efforts, and to help restore a representative government in the country.

The Iraqi government asked the council in a May 8 letter to wrap up the mission by the end of 2025 and that’s what the resolution does: It extends the mandate of the United Nations Assistance Mission in Iraq, known as UNAMI, for a final 19 months until December 31, 2025 when all its work will cease.

The U.S.-sponsored resolution asks Secretary-General Antonio Guterres to prepare “a transition and liquidation plan” in consultation with the Iraqi government by December 31, 2024, so UNAMI can start transferring its tasks and withdrawing staff and assets.

The council said it supports Iraq’s continuing stabilisation efforts, including its ongoing fight against the Islamic State group and al-Qaida extremists and their affiliates.

In 2014, the Islamic State group declared a caliphate in large parts of Iraq and Syria and attracted tens of thousands of supporters from around the world. The extremists were defeated by a U.S.-led military coalition in Iraq in 2017 and in Syria in 2019, but its sleeper cells remain in both countries.

Iraq is also seeking to wind down the military coalition formed to fight the IS. The roughly 2,500 U.S. troops are scattered around the country, largely in military installations in Baghdad and in the north. Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani has contended that the Iraqi security forces are capable of dealing with the remaining IS cells in the country and the coalition’s presence is no longer needed.

Mr. Al-Sudani’s office expressed its “welcome and appreciation” for the Security Council vote and said in a statement that the council decision “came as a result of the tangible progress that Iraq is witnessing at various levels”.

UN spokesperson Stephane Dujarric said secretary-general Guterres and UNAMI are “fully committed” to fulfilling the tasks in the resolution and “the United Nations remains strongly committed to supporting Iraq in its aspirations for a peaceful and secure future”.

Mr. Guterres notes “significant achievements” in Iraq since UNAMI was established in August 2003, Mr. Dujarric said, pointing to the mission’s assistance in advancing an inclusive political dialogue in the country, holding elections, promoting accountability, protecting human rights and coordinating the return and reintegration of people who are displaced within the country.

The resolution adopted on May 31 to close the UNAMI mission expresses support for Iraq’s reform efforts aimed at fighting corruption, respecting and protecting human rights, delivering essential services to its people, creating jobs and diversifying the economy.

It asks the secretary-general to streamline UNAMI’s tasks ahead of the mission’s closure to focus on providing advice, support and technical assistance to the government to strengthen preparations for free elections, including for the federal Parliament and for the Parliament in the Kurdistan region.

It also authorises UNAMI to facilitate progress toward finally resolving outstanding issues between Iraq and Kuwait, stemming from Saddam Hussein’s invasion of its smaller neighbour in August 1990.

In addition, the resolution says UNAMI should help with the return of internally displaced Iraqis and those in Syria, with providing health care and other services and with economic development. And it also authorises the mission to “promote accountability and the protection of human rights, and judicial and legal reform”.

U.S. Deputy Ambassador Robert Wood welcomed the resolution’s unanimous adoption and plans for an orderly wind-down of UNAMI.

“We all recognise that Iraq has changed dramatically in recent years and UNAMI’s mission needed to be realigned as part of our commitment to fostering a secure, stable and sovereign Iraq,” he told the council.

Russia’s Deputy UN Ambassador Anna Evstigneeva stressed that what was important for Moscow in voting for the resolution was that the United States took into account the priorities Iraq wanted UNAMI to focus on in its final months.

“We are convinced that in the 20 years since its establishment UNAMI has fully realised its potential to assist in the restoration of Iraqi statehood and that the people of Iraq are now ready to assume full responsibility for the country’s political future,” she said. “We express our firm support for Iraq sovereignty and oppose any interference in the country’s internal affairs. That is an imperative.”

United Nations:

At the request of Baghdad, the UN Security Council unanimously decided Friday that the United Nations political mission in Iraq would leave the country at the end of 2025 after more than 20 years.

Earlier this month, in a letter to the council, Iraqi Prime Minister Mohamed Shia al-Sudani called for the United Nations Assistance Mission for Iraq (UNAMI) to be closed.

Al-Sudani said UNAMI had overcome “great and varied challenges” and that “the grounds for having a political mission in Iraq” no longer exist.

The UNSC resolution adopted on Friday extended the mission’s mandate for “a final 19-month period until 31 December 2025 after which UNAMI will cease all work and operations.”

The mission was established by a UN Security Council resolution in 2003 at the request of the Iraqi government after the US-led invasion and fall of Saddam Hussein.

It advises the government on political dialogue and reconciliation, as well as helping with elections and security sector reform.

During the mission’s previous renewal in May 2023, the Council asked the secretary-general to launch a strategic review, which was overseen by German diplomat Volker Perthes.

In a report issued in March, Perthes signaled that an end to the mandate could be appropriate, concluding that “the two-year period identified by the government for the mission’s drawdown can be a sufficient time frame to make further progress.”

He also said that the period would provide time to reassure reluctant Iraqis that the transition “will not lead to a reversal of democratic gains or threaten peace and security.”

Given that UN missions can only operate with the host nation’s consent, Russia, China, Britain and France this month all voiced support for a transition in the partnership between Iraq and the United Nations.

The United States was more vague, with UN ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield saying UNAMI still had “important work to do,” and making no mention of Baghdad’s request.

She emphasized the mission’s role in organizing elections and promoting human rights, even though Iraq asked that the mission focus more on economic issues.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

A United Nations logo and flag are seen during the U.N. General Assembly at U.N. Headquarters in New York. File.
| Photo Credit: Reuters

An Indian peacekeeper who lost his life serving under the UN flag is among over 60 military, police and civilian peacekeepers to be honoured posthumously with a prestigious medal for their service and supreme sacrifice in the line of duty.

Naik Dhananjay Kumar Singh, who served with the UN Stabilisation Mission in the Democratic Republic of Congo (MONUSCO), will be honoured posthumously with the Dag Hammarskjold medal during a solemn ceremony on May 30 when the UN commemorates the International Day of United Nations Peacekeepers, a press release issued by the UN said on Tuesday.

Also read: Explained | What is the U.N. Peacekeeping mission?

India is the second largest contributor of uniformed personnel to UN Peacekeeping. It currently deploys more than 6,000 military and police personnel to the UN operations in Abyei, the Central African Republic, Cyprus, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Lebanon, the Middle East, Somalia, South Sudan, and Western Sahara. Nearly 180 Indian peacekeepers have made the supreme sacrifice in the line of duty, the highest number by far from any troop-contributing country.

During formal ceremonies at the United Nations Headquarters on May 30, Secretary-General António Guterres will lay a wreath at the Peacekeepers Memorial Site on the North Lawn to honour all UN peacekeepers who have lost their lives since 1948. He will also preside over a ceremony during which the Dag Hammarskjöld Medals will be awarded posthumously to 64 military, police, and civilian peacekeepers, who lost their lives serving under the UN flag, including 61 who died last year.

In his message to mark Peacekeepers’ Day, Mr. Guterres said the world organisation pays tribute to the more than 76,000 United Nations peacekeepers who embody humanity’s highest ideal: peace.

“Day in and day out, at great personal risk, these women and men bravely work in some of the most dangerous and unstable places on earth to protect civilians, uphold human rights, support elections and strengthen institutions,” he said, noting that more than 4,300 peacekeepers have paid the ultimate price while serving under the UN flag. “We will never forget them.” The press release said that in 1948, the historic decision was made to deploy military observers to the Middle East to supervise the implementation of Israel-Arab Armistice Agreements, in what became the United Nations Truce Supervision Organisation.

Since then, more than two million peacekeepers from 125 countries have served in 71 operations around the world. Today, about 76,000 women and men are serving in 11 conflict zones across Africa, Asia, Europe, and the Middle East.

The theme for the 2024 International Day of UN Peacekeepers is ‘Fit for the future, building better together’, denoting that while UN Peacekeeping has proven to be part of the solution for over 75 years — assisting host countries in navigating the difficult path from conflict to peace — the Secretary-General’s New Agenda for Peace policy brief sets out a path for multilateral peace and security operations to remain viable tools to address future crises and conflict.

“UN Peacekeeping remains a unique global partnership, with peacekeepers from over 120 countries making a meaningful difference every day to millions of people in some of the world’s most difficult places,” Under-Secretary-General for Peace Operations Jean-Pierre Lacroix said.

“As we respond to tomorrow’s challenges, UN Peacekeeping continues to evolve, leveraging partnerships to be nimble, responsive and fit-for-purpose, promote stability, protect the vulnerable and help to build a durable peace,” he said.

The International Day of UN Peacekeepers, marked on May 29, was established by the UN General Assembly in 2002, to pay tribute to all men and women serving in peacekeeping, and to honour the memory of those who have lost their lives in the cause of peace.

The story so far: Even as Israel continues to attack Southern Gaza’s Rafah, three European nations — Norway, Spain and Ireland — announced their formal recognition of Palestine as a state on May 22. The recognition is expected to take place on May 28. All three countries have urged Israel and Hamas to agree to an immediate ceasefire and allow aid to flow uninterrupted to Gaza.

Ireland’s Prime Minister Simon Harris likened Palestine’s struggle for statehood to Ireland’s fight for Independence from British rule, saying “Today, we use the same language to support the recognition of Palestine as a state” at a Dublin press conference. Ireland also recognised Israel’s right to “exist securely and at peace” with its neighbours, advising against Tel Aviv’s incursion into Rafah and rocket attacks by Hamas and Hezbollah.

Norewegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre said there was only one solution for Israelis and Palestinians alike: two states, living side by side, in peace and security. Similarly, Spain’s Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez noted that recognising Palestine was a step in favour of “peace, justice and moral consistency” and not against Israelis.

With the addition of these three nations, 146 of 193 nations in the world now recognise Palestine as a state. In the wake of Israel’s war on Gaza this year, Bahamas, Trinidad and Tobago, Jamaica and Barbados have recognised Palestine as a state. Countries which have not recognised Palestine’s statehood include the United States, Canada, France, Germany, Australia, Italy, United Kingdom and Japan.

Here’s a look at Palestine’s quest for statehood, the countries which recognise it and India’s stance on the two-state question.

Palestine’s statehood journey

1922- 1948: British Mandate and Jewish migration to Palestine

In 1922, the British established a ‘mandate’ expressing support for a national home for Jewish people in Palestine, leading to large-scale migration of Jews from Eastern Europe towards Palestine. The numbers swelled in 1930s and 1940s during the Nazi regime and the World War; the immigrant inflow was opposed by the Arabs who demanded independence for Palestine. Amid continued violence, calls for partition and independence, the British who were ruling the area, roped in the United Nations (UN) to resolve the issue.

1948-1987: Israel-Palestine partition, wars and ceasefire

The UN scrapped the mandate, partitioning Palestine into two independent states – one Arab and one Jewish, with Jerusalem as a separate international entity. In 1948, the Jewish state proclaimed its independence, calling itself Israel and capturing almost 77% of the territory mandated as Palestine by the British, including major areas of Jerusalem after two wars (Palestine war and Arab-Israeli war) with several neighbouring Arab nations. The remaining areas were controlled by Jordan and Egypt and run as an Arab state. Shortly thereafter, large-scale expulsion of Palestinians from Israel-controlled areas occurred, heightening tensions in the area.

Two consecutive wars occurred in 1967 and 1973 between Israel and the Arab coalition (Syria, Egypt and Jordan). In the 1967 war, Israel captured East Jerusalem and West Bank from Jordan, Gaza and Sinai from Egypt and Golan Heights from Syria. It later annexed Golan and East Jerusalem, but retuned Sinai to Egypt in the Camp David Agreement, which followed the 1973 war.

In the 1974 UN General Assembly, the body reaffirmed the inalienable rights of the Palestinian people to self-determination, national independence, sovereignty, and return. It also awarded the political coalition Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) the status of observer in the UN Assembly. However, tensions continued as militant wings of the PLO indulged in attacks against Israeli civilians and terror attacks on Israeli territories, leading to Israeli offensive against Palestinians in 1980s.

1988-2000: Palestine declares Independence

A breakthrough was achieved when PLO chairman Yasser Arafat acknowledged Israel’s right to exist and accepted a two-state solution to the decades-long conflict. On November 15, 1988, PLO adopted the Palestinian Declaration of Independence in its National Council meeting in Algiers, electing Mr. Arafat as the first President of Palestine. Under his leadership, the PLO engaged in several negotiations with the Israeli government — the 1991 Madrid Conference, 1993 Oslo Accords and the 2000 Camp David Summit. These talks led to partial withdrawal of Israeli forces, recognition of PLO as Palestine’s representative in bilateral talks, release of prisoners and establishment of a Palestine administration for self-rule in Gaza and West Bank. But the actual promise of the Oslo Accords, the creation of an independent, sovereign Palestine state, never materialised.

2001-Present: Rise of Hamas, Palestine’s UN membership bid

In 2007, the militant group Hamas snatched control of Gaza, after its elected government was dissolved by the Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas. Israel imposed an illegal blockade on Gaza in response, and Israel and Hamas have fought several wars ever since.

Tel Aviv also began expanding settlements in the West Bank while it withdrew all settlements from the Gaza Strip. As negotiations between Israel and Palestine broke down in 2010, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas applied to the UN for Palestine’s membership to the international body in 2011. Since then, the international body is yet to grant Palestine full membership. Recently, the UN Assembly adopted a resolution qualifying Palestine’s application with 143 votes favouring it, nine against and twenty-five abstaining from voting— the closest Palestine has gotten to membership.

 Which countries recognise Palestine and when?

1988-89: Recognition on declaration of Independence

When Palestine first declared Independence, several Muslim nations, including Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Jordan, Iran, Iraq, Egypt, Yemen, Oman, Turkey, Afghanistan, Pakistan, United Arab Emirates (UAE), Kuwait, and Qatar recognised Palestine. Similarly, Asian nations like India, Laos, Indonesia, China, Russia, Mongolia, Sri Lanka, Nepal, Bangladesh, and North Korea recognised Palestine along with African nations like Algeria, Mali, Nigeria, Somalia, Libya, Chad, Sudan, Madagascar, Mozambique, Botswana, and Namibia.

Several Eastern European nations like Ukraine, Poland, Belarus, Romania, Hungary, Czech Republic, and Slovakia too recognised Palestine once it declared its independence. However, the West was more hesitant.

Most of these nations have cited the Palestinian people’s right to a state and PLO’s legitimate representation of the Palestinian people as the reasons they have recognised Palestine as a state. Several believe that the two-state solution is the only viable option for long-term peace in the region, and hence view Palestine’s recognition as a state as imperative.

1990s-2010: Other African nations recognise Palestine

With the signing of the Oslo Accords in 1993, other African nations like Rwanda, Ethiopia, South Africa, and Malawi recognised Palestine as a state. Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan, Georgia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and the Philippines, too recognised Palestine as a state.

The 90s and early 2000s (prior to Hamas’s election victory in the Palestinian territories) was the most stable period in Israel-Palestine negotiations, though Israel’s occupation and settlements continued. Mr. Arafat himself enjoyed cordial relations with many African leaders; several African leaders have drawn parallels to the plight of enslaved or colonised Africans to that of Palestinians living under Israeli rule, making the state’s recognition a natural step. While almost all African nations recognise Palestine, condemnation of Israel’s attack on Gaza has not been uniform in the continent, indicating Israel’s growing influence in Africa.

2011-Present: Latin America’s ‘pink tide’ pushes the Palestinian cause

With Palestine applying for membership in the United Nations, many South American nations began recognising Palestine as a state. Several reports attribute this wave of recognition to the ‘pink tide’ — the rise of Left governments in elections. In 2010-11, Latin American nations like Brazil, Peru, Argentina, Chile, Guyana, Suriname, Ecuador, Uruguay and Paraguay recognised Palestine.

In the late 2010s, when Left governments were elected in Mexico, Columbia, Honduras, and Bolivia, a second wave of recognitions for Palestine flowed — with Mexico being the latest to recognise it in 2023.

The rise of Left politics in Latin America has escalated anti-US sentiments in some of these nations. After Tel Aviv waged war on Gaza, the heads of Latin American states have been most vocal in their condemnation. Bolivia, Colombia, Chile, Honduras, and Argentina censured Israel’s actions, with some even severing diplomatic relations with Israel.

According to international relations expert Mauricio Jaramillo, Latin America, which has usually maintained close relations with Israel, is sympathetic to the Palestine cause due to its own experience in the Cold War. Several military dictatorships backed by the US were propped up in Latin America during the Cold War, suppressing Leftist politics.

In Western Europe, Sweden (2014) and Iceland (2011) remain the only nations which have formally recognised Palestine as a state. Some western nations have hitherto held fast to the stance that Palestinian statehood was the prize for a final peace agreement in the region. However, UK Foreign minister David Cameron has indicated that the recognition of Palestinian statehood by European nations could come earlier, to help drive momentum towards a political settlement. Even France voted for Palestine’s membership to the UN in the general assembly on May 10.

However, the biggest hurdle towards recognition remains the US, which vetoed Palestine’s bid for full UN membership in April. It has privately discussed the issue with European allies but seeks clarity as to what the recognition of Palestine would mean in terms of policy, a report in the BBC suggested.

 What is India’s stance on Palestine?

In 1947, India opposed the partition of historical Palestine at the UN. It also remained a strong supporter of the Palestine cause. It became the first non-Arab nation to recognize the PLO as a legitimate representative of the Palestinian people. On its declaration of Independence, India recognised Palestine as a nation and opened its Representative office to the Palestine Authority in Gaza in 1996, later shifted to Ramallah in 2003.

India has always voted in favour of UN membership for Palestine, backing the state’s latest bid in a draft U.N. General Assembly resolution. In a first for an Indian state head, President Pranab Mukherjee visited Palestine in October 2015, while Prime Minister Narendra Modi followed in February 2018. Palestine’s President Mahmoud Abbas has visited India in 2005, 2008, 2010, 2012 and 2017.

In the Israel-Palestine dispute, India has always supported “a negotiated two-state solution towards establishing a sovereign, independent and viable state of Palestine within secure and recognised borders, living side by side in peace with Israel.” In the wake of the October 7 attack by Hamas on Israel, India condemned the attack and called for de-escalation and peaceful resolution of the conflict through dialogue and diplomacy. Seeking the release of prisoners on both sides, India has called for an ‘immediate ceasefire’ between Hamas and Israel as the death toll rose to alarmingly high levels.

The United Nations approved a resolution Thursday establishing an annual day to commemorate the 1995 genocide of more than 8,000 Bosnian Muslims by Bosnian Serbs, a move vehemently opposed by Serbs who fear it will brand them all as “genocidal” supporters of the mass killing.

The vote in the 193-member General Assembly was 84-19 with 68 nations abstaining, a reflection of concerns among many countries about the impact of the vote on reconciliation efforts in deeply divided Bosnia.

Supporters had hoped for 100 “yes” votes. Russia’s U.N. Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia, who voted against the resolution, told the assembly the combined abstentions and “no” votes — 87 — was more than the 84 votes in favor. It is also noteworthy that 22 countries skipped the meeting and didn’t vote, some reportedly because of the dispute over the commemoration.

The resolution designates July 11 as the “International Day of Reflection and Commemoration of the 1995 Genocide in Srebrenica,” to be observed annually starting in two months.

The resolution, sponsored by Germany and Rwanda, doesn’t mention Serbs as the culprit, but that didn’t stop the intense lobbying campaign for a “no” vote by Bosnian Serb President Milorad Dodik and the populist president of neighboring Serbia, Aleksandar Vucic, who had a Serbian flag draped over his shoulders as he sat in the assembly chamber during the vote.

Vucic told U.N. members after the vote that all those involved in the Srebrenica massacre have already been convicted and sentenced to prison and said the only purpose of the resolution was “to put moral and political guilt on one side” — the people of Serbia and Republika Srpska, the Bosnian Serb half of Bosnia.

“Those people that wanted to stigmatize Serbian people, they did not succeed and they will never succeed,” he said. “Nothing could have ever united Serbian people better than what was happening here today.”

Russia’s Nebenzia called the resolution’s adoption “a Pyrrhic victory for its sponsors,” saying if their goal ”was to divide the General Assembly … then they’ve succeeded brilliantly.”

But the resolution’s adoption was welcomed by Zeljko Komsic, the Croat member of Bosnia’s tripartite presidency, family members of Srebrenica victims, U.N. human rights chief Volker Türk and by many Western and Muslim nations.

The United States was one of more than 40 co-sponsors of the resolution, and the U.S. Mission to the United Nations welcomed its adoption in a tweet, saying “we honor the victims and commit to a more peaceful, stable world.”

“We actually expected more countries to be in favor, but we are satisfied,” Sehida Abdurahmanovic who lost several family members during the genocide, told AP. “Those who abstained and voted against — we will put them on a pillar of shame that we are building at the memorial center.″

On July 11, 1995, Bosnian Serbs overran a U.N.-protected safe area in Srebrenica. They separated at least 8,000 Muslim Bosniak men and boys from their wives, mothers and sisters and slaughtered them. Those who tried to escape were chased through the woods and over the mountains around the town.

The Srebrenica killings were a bloody climax of Bosnia’s 1992-95 war, which came after the breakup of then-Yugoslavia unleashed nationalist passions and territorial ambitions that set Bosnian Serbs against the country’s two other main ethnic populations, Croats and Muslim Bosniaks.

Both Serbia and Bosnian Serbs have denied that genocide happened in Srebrenica although this has been established by two U.N. courts.

Before the vote, Vucic urged U.N. members to vote “no,” calling the resolution “highly politicized.” He warned that it will open “Pandora’s Box,” and said it was not about reconciliation. He said it will only “open old wounds” and create “complete political havoc” in the region and at the U.N. He also strongly attacked Germany for trying to give “moral lessons” to the international community and to Serbia.

The determination in 2007 by the International Court of Justice, the U.N.’s highest tribunal, that the acts committed in Srebrenica constituted genocide, is included in the draft resolution. It was Europe’s first genocide since the Nazi Holocaust in World War II, which killed an estimated 6 million Jews and people from other minorities.

Germany’s U.N. Ambassador Antje Leendertse introduced the resolution, saying her country wants to build a multilateral system to prevent a repetition of Nazi Germany’s crimes and to honor the memory of the Srebrenica victims and support the survivors. The resolution “is not directed against anybody, not against Serbia,” she said, adding that if anything it is directed at the perpetrators of genocide.

Leendertse noted that there is an official U.N. commemoration of the 1994 Rwanda genocide on April 7 every year — the day the Hutu-led government began the killing of members of the Tutsi minority and their supporters. The resolution is aimed at “closing the gap” by creating a separate U.N. day to commemorate the victims of Srebrenica, she said.

Menachem Rosensaft, the son of Holocaust survivors who is an adjunct professor at Cornell Law School, told The Associated Press on Wednesday that designating July 11 as the official day of remembrance for the Srebrenica genocide “is a moral and legal imperative.”

The slain Muslim Bosniaks deserve to have their deaths and the manner of their deaths commemorated and Srebrenica was supposed to be a safe area but was abandoned by Dutch U.N. peacekeepers, leaving the Bosniaks who sought shelter there “to be murdered on the U.N.’s watch,” Rosensaft said.

Richard Gowan, U.N. director of the International Crisis Group, called the timing of the vote “unfortunate, given allegations that Israel is pursuing genocide in Gaza.”

“Thousands of journalists have fled their home countries in recent years to escape political repression, save their lives and escape conflict – but in exile they are often vulnerable to physical, digital and legal threats,” a U.N. investigator said on May 22.

Irene Khan said in a report to the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) that the number of journalists in exile has increased as the space for independent and critical media has been “shrinking in democratic countries where authoritarian trends are gaining ground.”

Today, she said, free, independent and diverse media supporting democracy and holding the powerful to account are either absent or severely constrained in over a third of the world’s nations, where more than two-thirds of the global population lives.

The U.N. independent investigator on the promotion and protection of the right to freedom of opinion and expression said most journalists and some independent media outlets have left their countries so they can report and investigate freely “without fear or favour.”

But Ms. Khan, a Bangladeshi lawyer who previously served as secretary general of Amnesty International, said exiled journalists often find themselves in precarious positions, facing threats against them and their families from their home countries without assured legal status or adequate support to continue working in their country of refuge.

Myanmar journalist gets a 20-year sentence for reporting on cyclone’s aftermath, news site says

“Fearing for their own safety or that of their families back home and struggling to survive financially and overcome the many challenges of living in a foreign country, many journalists eventually abandon their profession,” she said. “Exile thus becomes yet another way to silence critical voices – another form of press censorship.”

Ms. Khan, whose mandate comes from the Geneva-based U.N. Human Rights Council, said there are international legal protections for journalists in exile who range from full-time professional reporters to bloggers publishing on the internet and elsewhere. “The problem is “the failure of states to respect their obligations under international law,” she said.

In recent years, Ms. said, hundreds of journalists have fled from Afghanistan, Belarus, China, Ethiopia, Iran, Myanmar, Nicaragua, Russia, Sudan, Somalia, Turkey and Ukraine. In addition, smaller numbers have fled from a range of other countries including Burundi, Guatemala, India, Pakistan and Tajikistan, “to name just a few,” she said.

Ms. Khan said there is no data on human rights violations committed by countries outside their borders. “But there is anecdotal evidence including victims’ testimony, scholarly research and the experience of civil society organisations suggesting that “a high prevalence” of such “transnational repression” targets exiled journalists and media outlets,” she said.

Ms. Khan said “the butchering of exiled Saudi journalist, Jamal Khashoggi, in the consulate of Saudi Arabia in Istanbul was an outrageous, audacious act of transnational repression.” Khashoggi, a Washington Post columnist who entered the consulate on October 2, 2018, to get documents for his impending marriage, never emerged and his remains have never been found.

Ms. Khan also pointed to Turkey’s extraterritorial abductions and forcible return of at least 100 Turkish nationals, including journalists, from many countries, and Iran’s targeting of exiled Iranian journalists and media outlets as well as Iranian and Iranian-origin journalists and media staffers working for the BBC Persian-language service.

In February 2020, she said, prominent Iranian exiled journalist Rana Rahimpour received death threats against herself, her husband, her children and her elderly parents.

Ms. Khan said the world witnessed a blatant example of forced abduction when Belarus authorities used a false bomb threat in violation of international law to divert a commercial airliner as exiled media worker Raman Pratasevich was travelling to the country’s main airport in May 2021. He was arrested, convicted, sentenced to eight years in prison and later pardoned.

As for digital transnational repression, the U.N. special rapporteur said attempts to intimidate and silence journalists and their sources and promote self-censorship online have increased over the past decade.

Ms. Khan said common practices include “recruiting armies of trolls and bots to amplify vicious personal attacks on individual journalists to discredit them and their reporting, blocking exiled news sites or jamming broadcasts, and targeted digital surveillance.” “Online attacks including death threats, rape threats and smear campaigns have skyrocketed in the past 10 years,” she said.

“Digital surveillance also surged over the past decade as spyware enables authorities to access journalists’ phones and other devices without their knowledge,” Ms. Khan said. In early 2022, journalists from El Salvador fled to Costa Rica, Mexico and elsewhere after civil society investigations reported the use of Pegasus spyware on their devices.

She said exiled journalists often face two major legal threats from their home countries: “investigation, prosecution and punishment in absentia, and the pursuit of their extradition on trumped up criminal charges.”

Hong Kong’s recently adopted National Security Law, augmented by the Safeguarding National Security Ordnance, “criminalizes secession, subversion, terrorism and ‘collusion with foreign organizations’ in sweeping terms and with extraterritorial reach,” she said. It has been used extensively against independent journalists in Hong Kong and has hampered the work of journalists in exile and forced many to self-censor.

After Russia’s February 2022 invasion of Ukraine, Ms. Khan said, it adopted draconian laws punishing anyone discrediting the armed forces or disseminating false information about the military operation. This has led independent media to self-censor, shut down or leave the country. “Russian courts have issued sentences in absentia against several exiled journalists,” she said.

Ms. Khan called for countries hosting exiled journalists to provide them with visas and work permits.

“Exiled journalists also need better protection from physical and online attacks, long-term support from civil society and press freedom groups, and “they need companies to ensure that the technologies that are essential to practice journalism are not disrupted or weaponized against them,” she said.

United Nations:

 Indian economy’s growth rate projection for this year has been raised by 0.7 per cent to 6.9 per cent from the forecast made in January by the UN and it retains its position as the world’s fastest-growing large economy.

The better outlook is fueled by lower inflation, robust exports, and increased foreign investments, Hamid Rashid, the chief of the UN’s Global Economic Monitoring Branch, said on Thursday.

“The drivers (of higher projection) are very simple: inflation has come down significantly, and that means the fiscal position is not as constrained as in other countries,” he said at the release of the mid-year edition of the World Economic Situation and Prospects (WESP) report.

Exports, which is another element in the improved projection, have been “pretty robust” and India is also benefiting from more investments coming in from other Western sources while the flow to China is coming down, Rashid said.

“India has become an alternative investment source or destination for many Western companies,” he added.

Another factor benefiting India, he said, is the special import arrangement India has with Russia for oil that is lowering its cost, he said.

The WESP report also gave a positive picture of the employment situation, saying: “In India, labour market indicators have also improved amid robust growth and higher labour participation.”

It said that the women’s labour force participation has increased particularly in South Asia.

India’s growth projection for next year remains at 6.6 per cent, which was made in January.

Last year, the WESP report said, India’s economy grew by 7.5 per cent and in 2022 by 7.7 per cent when it received a big short-term boost coming out of the drastic Covid slowdown.

The report also revised the projection for the world economy this year to 2.7 per cent, an increase of 0.3 per cent from January.

“Most major economies have managed to bring down inflation without increasing unemployment and triggering a recession,” the report said adding a cautionary note, “However, the outlook is only cautiously optimistic as higher-for-longer interest rates, debt difficulties, and escalating geopolitical risks will continue to challenge stable and sustained economic growth”.

The developing economies on the whole are growing at a faster clip — clocking 4.1 per cent — than the developed economies which are expected to record only a 1.6 per cent growth rate this year.

However, the growth among developing countries is uneven, the WESP report stated.

While large developing economies like India, Indonesia and Mexico are benefiting from strong domestic and external demand, many African, Latin American and Caribbean economies are on a “low-growth trajectory” because of “lingering political instability”, higher borrowing costs and exchange rate fluctuations, it said.

China’s economy is projected to grow by 4.8 per cent this year, making it the second fastest-growing large economy.

The US economy is projected to grow by 2.3 per cent this year.

“Despite the most aggressive monetary tightening in decades, a scenario of hard landing of the United States economy has receded,” the report said.

Looking ahead, the WESP saw risks and opportunities in rapid technology changes.

“The breakneck pace of technological change — including in machine learning and artificial intelligence — presents new opportunities and risks to the global economy, promising to boost productivity and advance knowledge on the one hand, while exacerbating technological divides and reshaping labour markets on the other,” the report said.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)