United Nations

We, the women of this country, are swimming in an ocean of paradoxes. Incidents are happening which stop our brains from functioning normally. Sometimes our jaws drop. Sometimes we cannot hold back our tears of joy. 

At other times, we have fits of rage; we shiver from head to toe.
 
All of these are happening in this country!

Military action is not enough to fight violent extremism, a change in the political and economic environment and the mentality of people is needed to hit terrorism at its roots, Poland's former President Aleksander Kwasniewski said on Wednesday.

There have been 217 cases in a new foot-and-mouth disease outbreak since Sept. 29, Faruk Çelik, minister for food, agriculture and livestock said on Dec. 16.

Speaking at a press conference, Çelik said 117 of these outbreaks are under control while 100 others are still active.

The UN released its annual Human Development Index (HDI) for 2015 and Norway is on the top for the 12th year in a row.

Norway scored 0.944 followed by Australia and Switzerland making them the best countries to live in for health, life expectancy, education and high incomes, whereas Greece ranked 29th with 0.865.

Turkish authorities have since September been detaining scores of refugees, including from Iraq and Syria, and abusing and pressuring them to return home in breach of international law, Amnesty International said Dec. 16.

Victims’ groups and rights campaigners in Bosnia and Croatia praised the UN war crimes court’s decision to order a retrial for former Serbian state security officials Jovica Stanisic and Franko Simatovic.

Yemen's warring parties agreed on Dec. 16 to exchange hundreds of prisoners as part of confidence building measures under U.N.-sponsored peace talks now under way in Switzerland, officials from both sides said.

A draft resolution to be submitted to the UN Security Council takes "explicit" aim at the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) group and its lucrative trade in oil, French Finance Minister Michel Sapin told AFP in an interview Dec. 16.

For the first time in history, all 193 member states of the United Nations (UN) will be included in the selection of the next Secretary-General, who is to succeed incumbent Ban Ki-moon in 2017.

This was announced by the President of the General Assembly, Mogens Lykketoft, at the UN Headquarters in New York on Tuesday.

A ceasefire took effect in Yemen on Dec. 15, as parties to the civil war started United Nations-sponsored peace talks in Switzerland in a new push to end months of fighting that have killed nearly 6,000 people, a U.N. spokesman said.