UN official warns of climate change's human costs

The U.N.'s Emergency Relief Coordinator says the effects of climate change are already being felt across the developing world and he hopes much of the money devoted to the problem will go toward helping it adapt.

0

0

UN wants $7.1 bln for 2010 humanitarian work

The United Nations asked Monday for $7.1 billion to pay for its humanitarian work around the world next year, with Sudan and its troubled Darfur region most in need and Afghanistan rising to second.

0

0

Zimbabwe: Aid groups worry about govt disarray

Aid workers said Wednesday the disarray of the government of Zimbabwe is putting its most vulnerable citizens at risk as hunger and disease threatens to sweep the country.

0

0

Sudan allows 4 expelled aid groups back

The Sudanese government is allowing four aid organizations expelled from the country after its president was accused of war crimes to return under slightly different names, the U.N. humanitarian chief said Thursday.

1

0

Pakistan aid director: Generosity will dry up

Today I was actually up in the Buner district. This is where the IDPs [internally displaced people]have been moving out of. We wanted to try to get further into Buner to see what was going on in the conflict area.

2

6

US urges protest of Darfur aid group expulsions

The United States is urging leading African, Arab and Muslim groups to protest Sudan's ordering aid organizations out of Darfur, an expulsion it says threatens the lives of more than a million Muslims.

0

0

UN: One-third of Gaza dead, injured are children

Palestinian children are dying at a heavy rate in the Israeli-Hamas fighting — about one of every three persons killed, according to Gaza statistics.

2

1

UN: Gaza faces 'alarming' humanitarian situation

Gaza's 1.5 million residents are facing an "alarming" humanitarian situation under constant Israeli bombardment, with the main power plant shut down, overcrowded hospitals struggling to cope and very limited food supplies, U.N. officials said.

3

1

UN: $7 billion needed for 2009 humanitarian work

The United Nations asked Wednesday for $7 billion (5.5 billion euros) to fund its humanitarian work around the world in 2009 — almost double last year's appeal as a result of soaring food prices and crises in Africa, among other factors.

3

0

"Ingenuity, creativity, and guts have sustained this People longer than any other identifiable group of people in existence today. The only thing that may have outdone this is their sensitivity to needs of others.

8

7

A British engineer believed to have been kidnapped by al Qaeda is alive, Yemen's government said yesterday. The man, along with his South Korean wife and seven other hostages, was taken captive while in Yemen in June, 2009. None of the hostages have been named.

1

0

At least 28 UN civilian staff members were killed in violent acts in 2009, the majority in Afghanistan and Pakistan, the UN Staff Union said on Tuesday.

1

0

By Peter Greste BBC News, Parwan province, Afghanistan It is not hard to see why Alla Gul is upset. Her two-year-old daughter cries weakly in her arms with barely enough energy to eat.

3

2

Petty Officer 3rd Class Joshua Dae-Ho Carrell — a builder assigned to Naval Mobile Construction Battalion 3 — was part of a 24-person detachment that has been working on humanitarian construction projects in the capital city of Monrovia since August.

1

2

One year after the devastating attack on Hamas in Gaza a new wave of reports castigating Israel for war crimes has emerged.

2

1

Unidentified gunmen have shot and killed a former ICU member and head of the security of WFP security in Beledweyn town in central Somalia, witnesses told Shabelle radio on Tuesday.

1

0

Aid agencies have strongly criticised the international community for failing to help bring an end to Israel's blockade of Gaza. The charities made the accusation in a report published just ahead of the anniversary of Israel's offensive in the Gaza Strip.

9

27

OTTAWA – The military police watchdog agency agreed Wednesday to release censored versions of Richard Colvin's emailed warnings on Afghan detainees previously withheld by the government from a parliamentary committee.

1

2

Spanish humanitarian organisation Barcelona Accio Solidaria, which saw three of its volunteers kidnapped in Mauritania this weekend, announced Tuesday that its aid convoy will continue under military protection.

1

0

A Japanese aid worker abducted in Yemen last week was freed today after tribal leaders intervened with the kidnappers, a provincial governor said.

1

0

Armed men kidnapped a French humanitarian aid worker from his hotel in northern Mali overnight, in a region where Islamists from al-Qaida's North Africa branch have been active, officials said Thursday.

1

0

An unidentified gunman shot Unicef worker Nestor Bulahan at a bus terminal in Parang town, Maguindanao province, on Thursday morning. He died in hospital a short time later, a statement from the national police headquarters revealed.

1

0

A Frenchman working for the International Committee for the Red Cross (ICRC) has been seized by armed men in eastern Chad, the aid group said on Tuesday.

1

0

A Dubai-based technology expert followed a suicide bomber into a UN building just seconds before he was blown up, video footage has shown.

1

0

A Somali aid worker attached to a UN-Habitat project has been arrested in the middle Shabelle town of Jowhar, sources tell RBC Radio.

1

0

The U.N. refugee agency reports a Chadian colleague working in eastern Chad was killed in an ambush during the weekend. The UNHCR says dozens of humanitarian aid workers have been killed in eastern Chad this year.

2

0

Free Speech & Religion - Worth Fighting For

Today, the U.S. State Department issued its 2009 Report on International Religious Freedom. In her remarks, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton made several points that deserve special attention (http://www.state.gov/secretary/rm/2009a/10/130937.htm). Specifically:

3

0

The trouble with contemporary Christianity is that a massive bait and switch is going on. "Christianity" has essentially become a mechanism for allowing millions of people to replace being a decent human being with something else, an endorsed "spiritual" substitute.

11

23

French aid worker Gauthier Lefevre from the International Committee for the Red Cross (ICRC) was kidnapped in Darfur on Thursday, the organisation said in a statement. The ICRC currently has no indication of who the abductors might be or of their motives, the statement said.

2

0

Two members of Irish aid agency GOAL kidnapped at gunpoint in Sudan's Darfur region in July were freed early Sunday after more than 100 days in captivity, a Sudanese minister told AFP.

1

0

Three peacekeepers were wounded, two of them seriously, when their vehicle came under fire in the Darfur region of western Sudan on Saturday, officials of the UN-African Union peace mission said.

1

0

Masked gunmen shot dead two policemen in Sudan who were guarding a guesthouse used by World Food Program staff in South Darfur, the United Nations organization said.

1

0

10/13/2009 - PADANG, Indonesia (AFNS) -- Air Force medical professionals are providing care to victims of the recent earthquakes here, and behind them is another group of Airmen working behind the scenes to keep the operation running smoothly.

4

7

Jerry Custer spent a lot of time training others during 24 years as a law enforcement officer in Roanoke County. Starting this week, the retired police sergeant goes back to work to use that teaching experience in a new neighborhood -- Afghanistan.

4

11