United Nations

Rohingya militants say ceasefire to end on October 9

Rohingya militants whose attacks triggered an army crackdown in Myanmar's Rakhine state unleashing a huge wave of refugees said Saturday their one-month ceasefire would end in two days, but added they were open to peace if the government reciprocated.In a statement released through its Twitter account, the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) said its unilateral truce would end at midnight on October 9."The humanitarian pause was conducted in order to enable humanitarian actors to

7 October 2017
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Rohingyas to be relocated to mega refugee camp

Bangladesh on Thursday announced it would build one of the world's biggest refugee camps to house all the 800,000-plus Rohingya Muslims who have sought asylum from violence in Myanmar.The arrival of more than half a million Rohingya Muslims from Buddhist-dominated Myanmar since August 25 has put an immense strain on camps in Bangladesh where there are growing fears of a disease epidemic.A Bangladesh minister gave details of the mega camp as Myanmar's army blamed Rohingya militants f

6 October 2017
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Half of Cambodia's opposition have fled the country

Nearly half of Cambodia's opposition parliamentarians have fled abroad in the past month to escape a government crackdown that has battered their party with legal cases, an MP said on Wednesday.The exodus further imperils the prospects of a party that poses the only viable challenge to premier Hun Sen in next year's national poll.The strongman has smothered dissent in the lead-up to the election and is accused of picking off his critics through a series of dubious court cases.

4 October 2017
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The Rohingya alarm

PARIS – As is so often the case, it was an artist who sounded the warning. His name is Barbet Schroeder, and the alert that he issued came in the form of his fine, sober film The Venerable W., a portrait of Myanmar’s Buddhist monk Ashin Wirathu. Known as “W,” Wirathu is the other face of a religion that is widely perceived as the archetype of peace, love, and harmony.

4 October 2017
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US admin backs Tillerson's North Korea effort

Pentagon chief Jim Mattis tried to clear up doubts about the US administration's North Korea strategy Tuesday, backing Secretary of State Rex Tillerson's effort to find a diplomatic solution to the nuclear standoff.Defence Secretary Mattis was speaking two days after President Donald Trump appeared to undermine his top diplomat by saying Tillerson was "wasting his time" by maintaining contacts with Kim Jong-Un's regime.State Department officials insist Trump was not c

4 October 2017
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The urgency of refugee education

GENEVA – The world’s refugee crisis is most often measured in numbers. But for young refugees missing out on an education, the crisis can also be tracked by an irreversible metric: the passage of time.

3 October 2017
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Myanmar 'makes proposal' to take back Rohingya refugees

A senior Myanmar minister proposed Monday to take back the hundreds of thousands of Rohingya who have fled across the border after a military crackdown, Bangladesh said, but gave no details of how the huge task could be achieved.More than half a million Rohingya have arrived in Bangladesh over the last five weeks after militant attacks on police checkposts there sparked violent reprisals, with entire villages burned to the ground.Most are now living in desperate conditions in overcrowded camp

2 October 2017
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Two thousand Rohingya mass on Myanmar coast

More than 2,000 Rohingya have massed along Myanmar's coast this week after trekking from inland villages in Rakhine state to join the refugee exodus to Bangladesh, state media reported Saturday.They follow more than half a million fellow Rohingya who have emptied out of northern Rakhine in a single month, fleeing an army crackdown and communal violence the UN says amounts to "ethnic cleansing".The journey to Bangladesh is fraught with danger for the stateless Muslim minority, w

30 September 2017
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The health costs of environmental change

OXFORD – In recent years, the world has become increasingly preoccupied with the catastrophic potential of global warming and other human-induced environmental changes, and rightly so. But one of the most serious risks has been all but ignored: the threat to human health.To be sure, concerns about what a rise in global temperatures above pre-industrial levels could mean for the planet are entirely justified.

30 September 2017
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Fear of epidemic disaster at Rohingya camps

Rashida Begum steers clear of the water pump near the reeking latrine shared by more than 100 families in a grim corner of Bangladesh that has grown into one of the world's largest refugee settlements in just weeks."The pump works, but the water stinks, so we don't drink it," the Rohingya woman said in the squalid camp where her family of 11 has lived since fleeing Myanmar a fortnight ago.The UN has warned of a humanitarian "nightmare" unfolding in Bangladesh&#03

30 September 2017
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UN chief tells Myanmar to end 'nightmare'

UN chief Antonio Guterres exhorted Myanmar's leaders to end the "nightmare" faced by Rohingya refugees fleeing an army campaign, after at least 19 people drowned with scores more feared dead when a boat carrying Rohingya families capsized off Bangladesh.

29 September 2017
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US-China ties on an upswing as Trump plans trip

The often difficult relations between the world's greatest powers, China and the United States, appear to be improving again as the pair work to resolve the North Korea nuclear stand-off.Washington, and in particular US President Donald Trump, have until very recently been critical of Beijing's cautious approach to its belligerent and nuclear-armed neighbour.But, with a new round of UN-backed sanctions in place, the mood has improved, and US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson set off

29 September 2017
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