Security Council

The UN Security Council has asked Yemen's Houthi rebels to immediately stop attacks on vessels in the Red Sea that began in November.

Foreign Minister George Gerapetritis will visit Riyadh on Thursday, where he is scheduled to meet with his Saudi Arabian counterpart Prince Faisal bin Farhan Al Saud.

The United Nations named an outgoing Dutch minister its humanitarian coordinator for Gaza on Tuesday following last week's watered-down Security Council resolution which called for aid to be delivered to the strip "at scale."

The U.N. Security Council expressed "alarm" at growing violence in war-torn Sudan on Friday, a day after it reported that seven million people have been displaced by the conflict.

The United Nations Security Council was due to vote Wednesday on a much-delayed resolution calling for a pause to the Israel-Hamas war after members wrangled over wording while aid efforts in the Gaza Strip neared collapse.

The humanitarian situation in Gaza was rapidly deteriorating, with a senior U.N. official saying Israel's steps to allow in aid were "far short" of mounting need.

The vote comes days after the United States of America (US) blocked a previous Security Council resolution that would have called for a "humanitarian ceasefire" in the stricken Palestinian territory.

The United Nations Security Council will vote Monday on a new resolution calling for an "urgent and sustainable cessation of hostilities" in Gaza, as Washington exhibits growing impatience with key ally Israel.

A total of 153 countries called for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza in a vote at the UN General Assembly.

The resolution demanding an end to hostilities by Israel and the Islamist movement "Hamas" is non-binding. It follows a Security Council vote under a procedure set in motion by the UN secretary-general, in which such a ceasefire text was blocked by the United States.

The U.N. General Assembly overwhelmingly passed a non-binding resolution Tuesday demanding a ceasefire in Gaza — taking the lead from the paralyzed Security Council, and piling pressure on Israel and Washington.

Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant announced that Israel has encircled key areas under the control of Hamas in northern Gaza, in the Jabalia refugee camp and in the Shuja'iyya neighborhood of Gaza City. The battalions of the movement are "on the verge of disintegration", and participants in the attack on October 7 are among those arrested.