Author: Gulf News Week

The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights said the shortfall has already forced the loss of 300 jobs.The United Nations’ top human rights official says his office is struggling to operate after major funding cuts from donor governments, even as rights abuses escalate across the globe.Volker Turk, the UN high commissioner for human rights, said on Wednesday that the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights has $90m less than it needs this year. He told reporters the shortfall has already forced the loss of 300 jobs and reduced the organisation’s ability to monitor violations around the world.Recommended Stories…

media’s Justin Salhani compares Damascus on the day after al-Assad’s fall with one year later.Damascus, Syria – On the morning of December 5, 2025, a taxi drove me across the Lebanon-Syria border. This time was different from my first trip across, in the early hours of December 9, 2024, just a day after Bashar al-Assad fled Syria for Moscow.On that day, Syrian Army military vehicles were abandoned on the side of the highway to Damascus. Also abandoned, scattered along the highway’s shoulders, were the uniforms of the men who had once driven them.Recommended Stories list of 3 itemslist 1 of…

No senior figure has been held accountable since the devastating explosion more than five years ago.A Bulgarian court has rejected Lebanon’s request to extradite Igor Grechushkin, a Russian-Cypriot shipowner wanted in connection with the 2020 Beirut port explosion, a hammer blow for the city that came during the first months of the coronavirus pandemic and amid a deepening economic crisis.Grechushkin, 48, is the former owner of the Rhosus, the ship allegedly carrying the ammonium nitrate that detonated at Beirut port on August 4, 2020.Recommended Stories list of 4 itemslist 1 of 4Removing Blair from Gaza’s TPC is necessary correction of…

Death of 21-year-old raises alarm as rights groups document systematic torture in detention facilities, as Israel accelerates violence in occupied territory.A young Palestinian man has died while being held in captivity by Israeli authorities, according to the Palestinian Authority, as Israeli military and settler violence across the occupied West Bank reaches levels unseen in decades, and its genocidal war on Gaza continues unabated.Abdul Rahman al-Sabateen, 21, from Husan near Bethlehem, died at a Jerusalem medical facility on Tuesday night after being arrested by Israeli soldiers in late June, the PA said in a statement.Recommended Stories list of 3 itemslist 1…

Tony Blair’s anticipated role quickly emerged as a source of deep concern for many stakeholders.Many actors involved in negotiations to end Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza and begin its reconstruction breathed a collective sigh of relief when it was announced that former British Prime Minister Tony Blair, one of the most polarising figures in international diplomacy, was removed from the proposed “board of peace”, tasked with overseeing the transitional phase in the Strip. The announcement came at a highly sensitive moment, just as negotiations entered their second phase, focused on the security and economic arrangements necessary for stabilising the Strip…

The military gains made by forces of the Southern Transitional Council (STC) in southern Yemen mark a significant turning point in the country’s political and military conflicts.The latest fighting is between the STC and internationally recognised Yemeni government, known as the Presidential Leadership Council (PLC), and led by Rashad al-Alimi. The irony here is that the STC, led by Aidarus al-Zubaidi, is also a member of the Yemeni PLC. But the relationship between the two groups is shaky and at times, turbulent.Recommended Stories list of 2 itemslist 1 of 2Who are the separatists that claim control of all south Yemen?list…

Khaled Meshaal tells media surrendering weapons will ‘remove the soul’ from the Palestinian group as ceasefire momentum slips.The Head of Hamas Abroad, Khaled Meshaal, has offered assurances that the group would take measures to curb any future attacks on Israel from the besieged Palestinian enclave, but added that surrendering its weapons would be like “removing the soul” from the group.In an interview with media Arabic’s Mawazin, to be aired on Wednesday evening, Meshaal laid out the group’s positions on key issues amid rising concern that momentum on ceasefire talks may fade as the first phase draws to a conclusion.Recommended Stories…

The death toll from the destruction of the buildings includes several children.At least 19 people have been killed and 16 injured by the collapse of two buildings in Morocco’s historic Fes city, according to the state news agency.The death toll from the collapse of the four-storey buildings on Wednesday included children, local media reported.Recommended Stories list of 3 itemslist 1 of 3Gen Z protests across Morocco over World Cup spending and reformslist 2 of 3Protesters and police clash as Morocco unrest escalateslist 3 of 3Morocco’s Golden Eraend of listThe buildings were inhabited by eight families and were in the Al-Mustaqbal…

All crew members killed in crash at Port Sudan airbase as paramilitary forces seize strategic oil facility in West Kordofan.A military transport aircraft has gone down while attempting to land at an airbase in eastern Sudan, killing all the crew members in the war-ravaged nation.An Ilyushin Il-76 crashed on Tuesday as it approached the Osman Digna airbase in Port Sudan, near the city’s main airport, two military sources told the AFP news agency, citing a technical malfunction during the landing attempt.Recommended Stories list of 3 itemslist 1 of 3What’s changed in Sudan after the Rapid Support Forces’ control of Heglig?list…

The richest 10 percent of the world’s population owns three-quarters of all personal wealth.The richest 10 percent of the world’s population now owns three-quarters of all personal wealth, according to the newly released World Inequality Report 2026.Income is not much different, where the top 50 percent of earners take home more than 90 percent, while the poorest half of the world receives less than 10 percent of total income.The report, which has been published annually since 2018, notes that the 2026 edition arrives at a critical time. Worldwide, living standards are stagnating for many, while wealth and power are increasingly…