United Nations

In 1989, the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), an organization seemingly devoted to British English, declared July 11 World Population Day, a day to focus on population issues. They usually choose a different leitmotif each year.

Malala Yousafzai, the youngest winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, celebrated her 18th birthday in Lebanon on July 12 by opening a school for Syrian refugee girls and called on world leaders to invest in "books not bullets". 

Saudi-led air strikes and heavy shelling between warring factions shook several cities in Yemen on July 11, residents said, violating a United Nations humanitarian truce which took effect just before midnight. 

World powers talked deep into the night on July 11 seeking to break a deadlock in marathon negotiations with Iran and strike a historic deal to rein in Tehran's nuclear ambitions.

Turkey's president and prime minister have released messages of peace on the 20th anniversary of the Srebrenica massacre.

8,000 Muslim men and boys were killed in the eastern Bosnian town of Srebrenica by Serb troops in 1995. The massacre in the town, which was declared by the United Nations a safe haven for civilians, was later defined as genocide by two international courts.

Bosnia and Herzegovina marks on Saturday the twentieth anniversary of the Srebrenica massacre.

More than 8000 Bosnian Mulsim men and boys were killed by Bosnian Serb forces in the worst war crime in Europe since the end of the Second World War.

One of the worst but least told aspects of the four-year old Syrian civil war is the human tragedy of millions of Syrians who had to leave their homes to flee the violence committed by either the forces of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad?s regime or terror organizations. The number of Syrians who have sought shelter in neighboring countries exceeds four million, according to the U.N.

Rival Cypriot leaders said after negotiations on July 10 that any UN-brokered peace settlement for their divided island would be based on European Union principles.

The U.S. UN ambassador says she "hopes that (Aleksandar) Vucic will precisely in Srebrenica face the truth about the genocide and will accept it as such."

Vucic has not yet expressed willingness to acknowledge the genocide in Srebrenica, and was among the advocates of Russia's negative attitude towards a Srebrenica resolution in the UN, writes the Sarajevo-based daily Dnevni Avaz.

Foreign dignitaries were starting to arrive in Bosnia on July 10 to mark the 20th anniversary of Europe's worst massacre since World War II and attend the funeral of 136 newly found victims.