South Sudan
FILE - Yusra Mardini and Tachlowini Gabriyesos, of the Refugee Olympic Team, carry the Olympic flag during the opening ceremony in the Olympic Stadium at the 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo, Japan, Friday, July 23, 2021. The Olympic Refugee Foundation and the refugee Olympics team are the winners of this year’s Princess of Asturias Award for sports, the Spanish foundation that organizes the prizes said Wednesday, May 25, 2022. (AP Photo/David J. Phillip, File)
Refugee Olympic team awarded prestigious Spanish prize

May. 25, 2022 08:21 AM EDT

FILE - In this Friday, May 17, 2019 file photo, Madrid's Walter Tavares gestures during the Euroleague Final Four semifinal basketball match between CSKA Moscow and Real Madrid at the Fernando Buesa Arena in Vitoria, Spain. While the AfroBasket tournament doesn’t boast the star power of an Olympics, it does showcase ever-competitive and improving quality of basketball on the continent. Tiny Cape Verde has one big advantage as it tries to become champion of African basketball for the first time: 7-foot-3 former NBA draft pick Walter “Edy” Tavares. (AP Photo/Alvaro Barrientos, file)
Tall task: Cape Verde aims high in AfroBasket semifinals

By Ken Maguire Sep. 03, 2021 02:18 PM EDT

UN seeks proposals to end force on Sudan-South Sudan border

May. 11, 2021 10:56 PM EDT
The U.N. Security Council voted unanimously Tuesday to extend the mandate of the nearly 3,700-strong peacekeeping force in the disputed Abyei region on the...

FILE - In this Nov. 3, 2020 file photo, a malnourished girl, Rahmah Watheeq, receives treatment at a feeding center at Al-Sabeen hospital in Sanaa, Yemen. In a grim update to the U.N. Security Council Thursday, April 15, 2021, Mark Lowcock, the U.N. humanitarian chief warned that the world’s largest humanitarian crisis in Yemen is getting even worse with the COVID-19 pandemic “roaring back” in recent weeks as the Arab world’s poorest country faces a large-scale famine. (AP Photo/Hani Mohammed, File)
UN says 155 million people faced severe hunger last year

By Edith M. Lederer May. 05, 2021 10:36 PM EDT

Nobel doctor calls sexual violence in conflict a `pandemic'

By Edith M. Lederer Apr. 14, 2021 08:38 PM EDT
UNITED NATIONS (AP) — Nobel Peace Prize laureate Dr. Denis Mukwege warned Wednesday that the scourge of sexual violence and rape in all conflicts is now “a...

UN chief: 52 armies and groups suspected of sexual violence

By Edith M. Lederer Apr. 13, 2021 01:45 AM EDT
UNITED NATIONS (AP) — The COVID-19 pandemic led to a spike in gender-based violence last year and combatants continued to use sexual violence “as a cruel...

FILE - In this Saturday, June 27, 2020 file photo, trainees parade with the wooden mock guns which they use to train with, during the visit of the defense minister to a military training center in Owiny Ki-Bul, Eastern Equatoria, South Sudan. The scale of violence in South Sudan is "a lot worse" than during the country's five-year civil war, a United Nations commission announced Friday, Feb. 19, 2021, accusing senior officials of supporting armed groups that at times have included tens of thousands of fighters. (AP Photo/Maura Ajak, File)
UN mandates South Sudan force to prevent return to civil war

By Edith M. Lederer Mar. 12, 2021 11:42 PM EST

In this image made from UNTV video, United Nations Secretary General Antonio Guterres speaks during a U.N. Security Council high-level meeting on COVID-19 recovery focusing on vaccinations, chaired by British Foreign Secretary Dominc Raab, Wednesday, Feb. 17, 2021, at UN headquarters, in New York. (UNTV via AP)
UN appeals for $5.5 billion to avert famine for 34 million

By Edith M. Lederer Mar. 11, 2021 11:55 AM EST

Children use buckets to clear muddy floodwater from a dyke in the village of Wang Chot, Old Fangak county, Jonglei state, South Sudan Thursday, Nov. 26, 2020. Some 1 million people in the country have been displaced or isolated for months by the worst flooding in memory, with the intense rainy season a sign of climate change. (AP Photo/Maura Ajak)
'Our children die in our hands': Floods ravage South Sudan

By Maura Ajak Jan. 01, 2021 02:58 AM EST

Pope hopes to visit South Sudan, Lebanon if security permits

Dec. 24, 2020 12:16 PM EST
ROME (AP) — Pope Francis told the leaders of South Sudan and Lebanon on Thursday that he hopes to visit their countries but demanded they do more to bring...

A child fetches water with a bucket in Old Fangak county, Jonglei state, South Sudan Wednesday, Nov. 25, 2020. One county in South Sudan is likely in famine and tens of thousands of people in five other counties are on the brink of starvation, according to a new report released Friday, Dec. 11, 2020 by international food security experts. (AP Photo/Maura Ajak)
New report says part of South Sudan is in 'likely famine'

By Sam Mednick And Maura Ajak Dec. 11, 2020 03:26 AM EST

A malnourished girl Rahmah Watheeq receives treatment at a feeding center at Al-Sabeen hospital in Sanaa, Yemen, Tuesday. Nov. 3, 2020. Two-thirds of Yemen's population of about 28 million people are hungry, and nearly 1.5 million families currently rely entirely on food aid to survive, with another million people are set to fall into crisis levels of hunger before the year end, according to aid agencies working in Yemen. (AP Photo/Hani Mohammed)
In multiple countries, alarm over hunger crisis rings louder

By Eissa Ahmed, Tameem Akhgar And Samy Magdy Nov. 20, 2020 01:06 AM EST

FILE - In this April 5, 2017, file photo, Adel Bol, 20, cradles her 10-month-old daughter Akir Mayen at a food distribution site in Malualkuel, in the Northern Bahr el Ghazal region of South Sudan. The United Nations humanitarian office said Wednesday, Nov. 18, 2020 it is releasing $100 million in emergency funding to seven countries at risk of famine in Africa and the Middle East amid conflict and the COVID-19 pandemic, while the humanitarian chief says returning to a world where famines are common would be "obscene." (AP Photo, File)
Warning of famine, UN releases $100M to seven countries

Nov. 18, 2020 05:07 AM EST

The head of Sudan's sovereign council, Gen. Abdel-Fattah Burhan, seated center-left, President of South Sudan Salva Kiir, seated center, and President of Chad Idriss Deby, seated center-right, attend a ceremony to sign a peace deal between Sudan's transitional authorities and a rebel alliance, in Juba, South Sudan, Saturday, Oct. 3, 2020. Sudan's transitional authorities and a rebel alliance on Saturday signed the peace deal initialed in August that aims to put an end to the country's decades-long civil wars, in a televised ceremony in Juba, South Sudan marking the agreement. (AP Photo/Maura Ajak)
Rebel leaders who inked deal with government return to Sudan

By Samy Magdy Nov. 15, 2020 08:16 AM EST

FILE - In this Aug. 25, 2019 file photo, a worker weighs food aid provided by the World Food Program for distribution, in Sanaa, Yemen. The World Food Program won the Nobel Peace Prize on Friday, Oct. 9, 2020 for its efforts to combat hunger amid the coronavirus pandemic, recognition that shines light on vulnerable communities across the Middle East and Africa that the U.N. agency seeks to help, those starving and living in war zones that may rarely get the world’s attention.(AP Photo/Hani Mohammed, File)
WFP fights hunger in food-deprived places, crises, war zones

By Isabel Debre Oct. 09, 2020 09:17 AM EDT

FILE - In this Feb. 20, 2018 file photo, a Sudanese refugee man sits on his bike after collecting food from a World Food Program (WFP) food distribution in Yida, South Sudan. The World Food Program on Friday, Oct. 9, 2020 won the 2020 Nobel Peace Prize for its efforts to combat hunger and food insecurity around the globe. (AP Photo/Sam Mednick, File)
World Food Program wins Nobel Peace Prize as hunger surges

By Dalatou Mamane, Frank Jordans And Vanessa Gera Oct. 09, 2020 02:11 AM EDT

UN report says South Sudan has healed little since civil war

By Cara Anna And Maura Ajak Oct. 06, 2020 07:33 AM EDT
JOHANNESBURG (AP) — South Sudan has made no concrete steps toward national healing more than two years after the end of a civil war that killed nearly 400,000...

Flooding surrounds a house in Lenyari in the Greater Pibor Administrative Area, South Sudan Thursday, Sept. 10, 2020. Flooding has affected well over a million people across East Africa, another calamity threatening food security on top of a historic locust outbreak and the coronavirus pandemic. (Tetiana Gaviuk/Medecins Sans Frontieres via AP)
Flooding affects more than 1 million across East Africa

Sep. 18, 2020 11:20 AM EDT

UN raises alarm over refugee killings in Uganda settlement

By Rodney Muhumuza Sep. 15, 2020 05:03 AM EDT
KAMPALA, Uganda (AP) — The United Nations refugee agency says it is “saddened and alarmed” after at least 10 refugees were killed in an attack last week by...

A pregnant police trainee sits with other trainees during the visit of the defense minister to a police training center in Kaljak, South Sudan Saturday, July 11, 2020. At crowded camps in South Sudan, former enemies are meant to be joining forces and training as a unified security force after a five-year civil war so they can help the shattered country recover but they can barely find enough food. (AP Photo/Maura Ajak)
Hunger, squalor mar South Sudan post-war unification efforts

By Maura Ajak Aug. 16, 2020 02:10 AM EDT