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The long-drawn-out garbage crisis has been grappling Lebanon from its North to its South, but on September 15, thousands of people united to clean up the country's streets, mountains, and beaches in response to a call by Junior Chamber International (JCI) NGO and the UN Information Centre (UNIC) in Beirut, as well as other NGOs who joined hands to mark World Clean Up Day.

The agreement between Turkey and Russia to create a demilitarized buffer zone protecting civilians living in Idlib, Syria, has been welcomed by United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres and the world body’s humanitarian chief, who called on all warring parties and countries supporting them to make it effective.

Around 6.3 million children under the age of 15, died from mostly preventable causes last year, the equivalent to 1 child dying every 5 seconds, according to a new report compiled by a group of United Nations agencies. Newborn babies account for half of the deaths.

Under the umbrella of a mounting garbage crisis, this much-needed initiative served as a reminder for the Lebanese not to wait for politicians and to start taking action.

Over 25 locations in Lebanon joined World Cleanup Day, a global positive civic action taking place on Saturday for the first time who welcomed energetic volunteers joining forces to clean up public areas and beaches.

With record-breaking heat once again enveloping the earth this year, United Nations Secretary-GeneralAntónio Guterres said it was also “a pivotal time for climate action”, marking  the International Day for the Preservation of the Ozone Layer, on Sunday.

Like few today, former United Nations Secretary-General, Kofi Annan, could “bring people together, put them at ease, and unite them towards a common goal”, said the current UN chief, António Guterres on Thursday, speaking at his predecessor’s funeral in Ghana.

“Since the shock of Kofi’s death, I have been reflecting on what made him so special,” Mr. Guterres told those assembled, saying he was “both one-of-a-kind and one of us.” 

The only UN chief to have emerged from the ranks of its staff, passed away after a short illness on 18 August.  He was 80.

More than 18 million new cases of cancer are expected this year and it’s estimated that 9.6 million people will die from various forms of the disease in 2018, the UN’s International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) said on Wednesday.

According to IARC, a specialized cancer agency of the World Health Organization, the disease is a growing global health threat.

The “Changemaker Festival”, which aims at bridging the gap between youth and the education sector on the one hand, and entrepreneurship and its impact on them on the other, convened for the first time in Lebanon on 8-9 September under the patronage of Lebanese Prime Minister-designate Saad Hariri and in collaboration with the UN Information Centre (UNIC) in Beirut.

With food deprivation on the rise due to conflict and climate change, more people went hungry in 2017 than at any time in the previous decade, according to the latest edition of the UN’s annual multi-agency flagship report on the State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World.

A full-scale battle for Idlib must be avoided at all costs, the United Nations Secretary-General has stressed, warning that failure to do so would unleash “a humanitarian nightmare unlike any seen in the blood-soaked Syrian conflict” so far.