United Nations

Submitted by Carey Wedler via TheAntiMedia.org,

“The war on drugs has failed,” the editors of the peer-reviewed British Medical Journal declared this week, arguing that doctors should lead the global effort to reform drug policy.

Fiona Godlee, the journal’s editor-in-chief, and Richard Hurley, its features and debates editor, penned an analysis citing academic and scientific reports to argue global policies on drug use — including the United Nations’ — have fallen drastically short.

Colum Lynch has more details on how the Saudis pressured the U.N. into removing its Yemen war coalition from the blacklist of violators of children’s rights:

Saudi Arabia threatened this week to break relations with the United Nations and cut hundreds of millions of dollars in assistance to its humanitarian relief and counterterrorism programs to strong-arm the U.N. into removing Riyadh and its allies from a blacklist of groups that are accused of harming children in armed conflict.

The U.N. has made a humiliating, disgraceful reversal in its reporting on the Saudi-led coalition’s crimes in Yemen:

The United Nations said on Monday it had removed the Saudi Arabia-led coalition fighting in Yemen from a child rights blacklist pending a joint review by the world body and the coalition of the cases of child deaths and injuries.

The UN has warned that severe food shortages across Yemen amid relentless Saudi attacks, has bought the war torn country “one step” closer to famine. John Ging, director of operations at the UN’s Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (UNOCHA),  said that over 10 million Yemenis need basic healthcare and over 7.6 million “are severely food insecure” He added that this is “one step below the level of famine” on the international index of food insecurity.

The UN has warned that Africa could be facing the worst food crisis in 25 years as the continent struggles with severe drought. By Christmas up to 50 million people will need food. ITV reports: Severe weather conditions caused by the worst El Niño – a weather phenomenon that affects rainfall patterns – in 30 years are worsening and drought has ravaged crops and driven up food prices. More than 31 million need food now and 20 million more are likely to run out this year, the UN said.