UN Interviews

Poet and activist Salome Agbaroji was awarded the prestigious role of National Youth Poet Laureate of the United States in 2023.

A fighter for social justice, her identity is centred on being “an artist at its core”, aiming to inspire others through words.

Earlier this week, Ms. Agbaroji sat down with UN News’s Pooja Yadav at UN Headquarters in New York after taking part in commemorations for the International Day of Remembrance of the Victims of Slavery and the Transatlantic Slave Trade.

As violence escalates in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo, with the Rwanda-backed rebel group M23 looking to gain more territory, UN peacekeepers are working flat out to protect civilians amid a worsening humanitarian crisis.

Speaking to UN News’ Jérôme Bernard in New York, the chief of the UN peacekeeping mission in the DRC (MONUSCO), Bintou Keita, outlined the mission’s role in any ceasefire, protecting the displaced and confronting sexual violence and child recruitment.

Around a third of the 12 million Sudanese displaced following nearly three years of brutal conflict are women and girls of reproductive age, according to data from the UN sexual and reproductive health agency (UNFPA).

Aside from the brutality of rape, coupled with other physical and mental traumas, some of the 300,000 pregnant women who are running for safety “end up giving birth on the roadside”.

Reparations for the crimes of the transatlantic slave trade “can’t be quantified” given the vast historical sweep of human history, according to the first Black African to be awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature, Wole Soyinka.

The longtime Nigerian democracy activist was at UN Headquarters in New York to take part in commemorations for the International Day of Remembrance of the Victims of Slavery, telling the General Assembly that it remains crucial to confront centuries of wrongdoing.

Chad is seeing an influx of Sudanese refugees whose numbers are expected to pass the one million mark in coming months.

Multiple UN agencies including the UN Development Programme, UNDP, have joined forces to help the most vulnerable; one example is the construction of a women’s centre that doubles as a safe haven.

Francis James, the UNDP Resident Representative in Chad – said that the centre in Adre in tyheastern Chad is due to be inaugurated next month.

Growing up just a few blocks from the United Nations in New York City, Sarah Lewis was drawn to narratives that shape who belongs and who counts – often reflecting on what schools were neglecting to teach.

An Associate Professor of African and African American Studies at Harvard University, Ms. Lewis is also the founder of the Vision & Justice programme there, which bridges research, art and culture to foster equity and justice.

After 14 years of war, the fall of Bashar al-Assad’s regime in December 2024 marked a new chapter for Syria.

However, with 90 percent of the population living in poverty and over a million displaced Syrians now preparing to return home, the country faces immense challenges as it begins the process of rebuilding.

Filmmaker Waad Al-Kateab documented life under siege in Aleppo in her award-winning film, For Sama, before being forced to flee Syria in 2016. She has since become a leading advocate for justice and human rights.

Cyclone Jude made landfall in Mozambique on Monday, bringing powerful winds and heavy rainfall that caused widespread destruction.

This marks the third cyclone to strike the country in just four months, with significant flooding expected, particularly in the Zambezia and Nampula regions.

By the time a ceasefire began last November ending the devastating war in Lebanon between Hezbollah fighters and the Israeli military, more than 4,000 people had been killed and at least 16,600 injured.

The violence also uprooted hundreds of thousands and caused widespread damage to key infrastructure, exacerbating Lebanon’s long-running, multi-pronged crisis.