The UN yesterday said that US$35 billion would be needed for aid next year, as the COVID-19 pandemic leaves tens of millions more people in crisis, and with the risk of multiple famines looming.
The world body’s annual Global Humanitarian Overview estimated that 235 million people worldwide would need some form of emergency assistance next year — a staggering 40 percent increase in the past year.
“The increase arises almost entirely because of COVID-19,” UN Undersecretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator Mark Lowcock told reporters.
Next year, one in 33 people worldwide would be in need of aid, the report found, saying that if all of them lived in one country, it would be the world’s fifth-largest nation.
The annual appeal by UN agencies and other humanitarian organizations usually presents a depressing picture of soaring needs brought on by conflicts, displacement, natural disasters and climate change.
However, the pandemic, which has killed more than 1.45 million people worldwide, has disproportionately hit those “already living on a knife’s edge,” it said.
“The picture we are presenting is the bleakest and darkest perspective on humanitarian need in the period ahead that we have ever set out,” Lowcock said.
The money requested in the appeal would be enough to help 160 million of the most vulnerable people across 56 countries, the UN said.
For the first time since the 1990s, extreme poverty is set to rise, life expectancy will fall and the annual death toll from HIV, tuberculosis and malaria could potentially double.
“Possibly the most alarming thing ... is the threat of the return of famines, potentially in multiple locations,” Lowcock said.
By the end of this year, the number of acutely food-insecure people worldwide could swell to as much as 270 million — an 82 percent increase over the pre-pandemic number.
Conditions in Yemen, Burkina Faso, South Sudan and northeastern Nigeria indicated they are already on the brink of famine, while a range of other countries and regions, including Afghanistan and the Sahel, were also “potentially very vulnerable,” Lowcock said. “If we get through 2021 without major famines, that will be a significant achievement.”
Yesterday’s appeal showed that war-ravaged Syria and Yemen top the list of the countries most in need of humanitarian assistance.
Raising the full amount at a time of global economic crisis could be a daunting task, but while the total seemed high, it was tiny compared with what wealthy countries are pumping in to rescue their tanking economies, Lowcock said.
ROLLER-COASTER RIDE: More than five earthquakes ranging from magnitude 4.4 to 5.5 on the Richter scale shook eastern Taiwan in rapid succession yesterday afternoon Back-to-back weather fronts are forecast to hit Taiwan this week, resulting in rain across the nation in the coming days, the Central Weather Administration said yesterday, as it also warned residents in mountainous regions to be wary of landslides and rockfalls. As the first front approached, sporadic rainfall began in central and northern parts of Taiwan yesterday, the agency said, adding that rain is forecast to intensify in those regions today, while brief showers would also affect other parts of the nation. A second weather system is forecast to arrive on Thursday, bringing additional rain to the whole nation until Sunday, it
LANDSLIDES POSSIBLE: The agency advised the public to avoid visiting mountainous regions due to more expected aftershocks and rainfall from a series of weather fronts A series of earthquakes over the past few days were likely aftershocks of the April 3 earthquake in Hualien County, with further aftershocks to be expected for up to a year, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Based on the nation’s experience after the quake on Sept. 21, 1999, more aftershocks are possible over the next six months to a year, the agency said. A total of 103 earthquakes of magnitude 4 on the local magnitude scale or higher hit Hualien County from 5:08pm on Monday to 10:27am yesterday, with 27 of them exceeding magnitude 5. They included two, of magnitude
CONDITIONAL: The PRC imposes secret requirements that the funding it provides cannot be spent in states with diplomatic relations with Taiwan, Emma Reilly said China has been bribing UN officials to obtain “special benefits” and to block funding from countries that have diplomatic ties with Taiwan, a former UN employee told the British House of Commons on Tuesday. At a House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee hearing into “international relations within the multilateral system,” former Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) employee Emma Reilly said in a written statement that “Beijing paid bribes to the two successive Presidents of the [UN] General Assembly” during the two-year negotiation of the Sustainable Development Goals. Another way China exercises influence within the UN Secretariat is
Taiwan’s first drag queen to compete on the internationally acclaimed RuPaul’s Drag Race, Nymphia Wind (妮妃雅), was on Friday crowned the “Next Drag Superstar.” Dressed in a sparkling banana dress, Nymphia Wind swept onto the stage for the final, and stole the show. “Taiwan this is for you,” she said right after show host RuPaul announced her as the winner. “To those who feel like they don’t belong, just remember to live fearlessly and to live their truth,” she said on stage. One of the frontrunners for the past 15 episodes, the 28-year-old breezed through to the final after weeks of showcasing her unique