News in Brief 20 December 2023 |

This is the News in Brief from the United Nations. 

Barely a drop of safe water to drink in Gaza, UN aid agency warns

Gazans have barely a drop of safe water to drink, the head of the UN Children’s Fund UNICEF warned on Wednesday.

Without access to clean water, “many more children” will soon die from disease, said Catherine Russell.

UNICEF said that recently displaced children in southern Rafah governorate have only 1.5 to two litres of water every day, and that water services were “at the point of collapse”.

For survival alone, the estimated minimum is three litres per day.

In a related development, the UN World Food Programme announced that the first aid convoy from Jordan had reached Gaza after weeks of coordination. 

The 46-truck convoy was carrying 750 metric tons of food assistance, the UN agency said, adding that it was hopeful this could lead to “more sustained and scaled-up access” to more vulnerable people.

Ukraine: OCHA condemnation for strikes on aid infrastructure by Russian military

To Ukraine, where the UN’s top aid official in the country condemned Wednesday’s indiscriminate strikes on humanitarian facilities and supplies.

UN Humanitarian Coordinator for Ukraine Denise Brown said that much-needed relief items were destroyed in Kherson when warehouses of the Ukrainian Red Cross Society and a local non-governmental organization Shchedryk were burned to the ground.

The facilities of an international NGO were also impacted in the strikes which damaged homes, a health facility and injured civilians, Ms. Brown reported.

The aid official also underlined that such attacks affect the ability of humanitarians to operate in civilian areas – in addition to being prohibited under international law.

IOM welcomes new migrant legislation in Greece

The UN migration agency on Wednesday welcomed the decision by the Greek authorities to help more migrants and asylum seekers legally access the labour market in Greece.

It follows the Greek parliament’s approval of a new law to grant around 30,000 undocumented migrants the right to live and work in the country for up to three years.

The move is expected to fill gaps in unskilled labour in Greece, especially in agriculture, tourism and the construction industry.

In a tweet, the International Organization for Migration explained that the new legislation would give a boost to migrants’ rights and protect them from exploitation, while generating economic and social contributions for Greece.

The development comes as the European Union struck a deal to overhaul its joint migration system after three years of negotiation in Brussels.

The EU migration and asylum pact is designed to make it easier to process migrants, deport failed asylum seekers and give governments greater control of their borders while spreading responsibility for legal migration more fairly across the bloc.