Ethiopia, Middle East & other topics - Daily Press Briefing (19 October 2021)

The United Nations of Earth reporting on this issue: "Ethiopia, Middle East & other topics - Daily Press Briefing (19 October 2021)"
The topics: Noon briefing by Farhan Haq, Deputy Spokesperson for the Secretary-General. Highlights: - Ethiopia - Middle East - Yemen - Lebanon - Myanmar - South Sudan - South Sudan/Peacekeeping - Afghanistan - Bosnia and Herzegovina - COVID-19/Papua New Guinea - WMO Report - Global Foreign Direct Investment - WFP Report - Guests Today and Tomorrow ETHIOPIA On Ethiopia, the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs says that the situation today in Mekelle, in Tigray, is calm but tense. Local health workers have reported that three children were killed and one person injured in an airstrike on the outskirts of Mekelle yesterday. A second airstrike in Mekelle town later in the day reportedly injured nine people and damaged houses and a nearby hotel. Humanitarians are alarmed at the intensification of the conflict and once again remind all parties to the conflict of their obligations under international humanitarian law to protect civilians and civilian infrastructure. The UN also calls for unrestricted and sustained humanitarian access to all people in need. MIDDLE EAST Tor Wennesland, the Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process, briefed the Security Council today. He welcomed the ongoing engagement between senior Israeli and Palestinian officials, and strongly encourages a further expansion of such efforts which can improve conditions on the ground and pave the way towards re-invigorating the peace process. He added that we should have no illusions about the current state of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The situation in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT) continues to deteriorate, and we have seen no progress towards realizing a two-State solution, he warned. Mr. Wennesland said that the security situation in Gaza remains fragile and the security dynamics in the occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem, are deteriorating, including growing tensions in and around the Holy Sites. We can no longer lurch from crisis to crisis, he said. Our approach cannot be to address the current situation piecemeal – incident by incident - on a short-term day-to-day basis as stand-alone issues. A broader package of parallel steps by the Government of Israel, the Palestinian Authority and the international community is needed, Mr. Wennesland said. YEMEN UNICEF reported today that the Yemen conflict has just hit another shameful milestone: 10,000 children have been killed or maimed since fighting started in March 2015. That’s the equivalent of four children every day for the last six and a half years. These are of course the cases the UN was able to verify. Many more child deaths and injuries go unrecorded, to all but those children’s families. UNICEF added that four out of every five children need humanitarian assistance. That’s more than 11 million children. In addition, 400,000 children suffer from severe acute malnutrition, more than two million children are out-of-school and another four million are at risk of dropping out. Full Highlights: https://www.un.org/sg/en/content/noon-briefing-highlight?date%5Bvalue%5D%5Bdate%5D=19%20October%202021


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