USAID

A Highly Respected UN Legacy to Fight Corruption Crumbles in Guatemala

• August 25, 2021

When Guatemala’s Attorney General Consuelo Porras recently removed the anticorruption leader Juan Francisco Sandoval from his post as the special prosecutor against impunity, her action ended the last semblance of prosecutorial independence generated by one of the most successful projects run by the United Nations: the International Commission Against Impunity in Guatemala, or Cicig. …

Humanitarian Aid, Latin America, Migration, Secretary-General, US-UN Relations

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WORLDVIEWS

Unicef’s Next Boss Should Be an Internationalist and a Development Pro

Ellen Tolmie

• August 9, 2021

Jockeying for Unicef’s next executive director is well underway, after the July 13 announcement by its current head, Henrietta Fore, that she is leaving before the year’s end. She is going because of a family health emergency and well before her five-year term, which began January 2018, is up. Fore is Unicef’s seventh executive …

UN Agencies, WORLDVIEWS

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The US Raises Its UN Profile, but Not Its Support

Barbara Crossette

• January 25, 2020

The naming of Jonathan Moore, a senior United States Foreign Service officer, to the position of Acting Assistant Secretary of State for International Organization Affairs, signals that in the United Nations’ 75th year, the Trump administration is getting serious. The move doesn’t mean that the US is increasing support for the organization, of course, or …

Gender Violence, US-UN Relations

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WORLDVIEWS

The Strange Bedfellows of Unesco World Heritage Sites

Jeffrey Laurenti

• February 11, 2019

In the fall — before the caravan, before the firings, before the shutdown, before the wall — Melania Trump concluded her first solo goodwill tour with a photogenic visit to the Great Pyramid and Sphinx of Egypt, the only surviving complex of the seven wonders of the ancient world. “It was a nice opportunity …

UN Agencies, Unesco, US-UN Relations, WORLDVIEWS

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No Room for LGBT Rights in the New UN Development Goals

Barbara Crossette

• May 17, 2015

Before this year ends, the United Nations will have committed itself and its 193 member governments to a new 15-year development strategy to be hailed as a blueprint for ending poverty, expanding social justice and strengthening equality. Equality for whom is the question. Missing by deliberate design from the new plan, called the Sustainable …

Development, LGBT, Sustainable Development Goals

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GOINGS-ON

The US Names a Negotiator for the Next Set of Development Goals

PassBlue

• January 26, 2015

Tony Pipa has been named the principal United States negotiator for the United Nations post-2015 development agenda, also known as the Sustainable Development Goals, which are being written and finalized this year to replace the soon-expiring Millennium Development Goals. The appointment reflects US efforts to become more fully engaged in the process of UN …

GOINGS-ON

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UN WOMEN'S CONFERENCE 2014

A Kenyan Says US Policy Could Advance Women’s Rights Everywhere

Barbara Crossette

• March 27, 2014

Can a bill languishing in the United States Congress make a difference to half the people of a country more than 7,500 miles away? Yes, said Wangechi Wachira-Moegi, the executive director of an organization in Nairobi, Kenya, that works to bring justice to women in the courts and open opportunities for them in political …

Gender Violence, Women

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WORLDVIEWS

Business in Kinshasa Rolls On While Eastern Congo Simmers

Christina Juan

• September 11, 2013

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The Democratic Republic of the Congo is riddled with negative media attention. In the midst of virtually persistent conflict in eastern Congo since 1993, what goes on far away in Kinshasa, the capital of this massive country? Economic reforms, health care developments and a culture of music and creativity are providing …

WORLDVIEWS

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Gates and the British Government Seize the Lead for Family Planning

Barbara Crossette

• July 22, 2013

With the world population now growing faster than predicted only two years ago by the United Nations Population Division, a campaign to make family planning and the wider provision of contraceptives higher priorities in foreign aid policy after years of neglect has taken off. But it is largely being done outside the UN system, …

Africa, Health and Population, Humanitarian Aid, Women

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Today’s Youth, Facing Mostly Grim Futures

Barbara Crossette

• June 12, 2013

No group in the global population has more at stake after the Millennium Development Goals‘ deadline of 2015 than children and young people. That would seem obvious, but predictions vary widely on what kind of a world these young people will inherit and how they are prepared for whatever happens. The Population Reference Bureau, …