UN News Today 24 April 2026 |

Middle East war: Hormuz seizures on the rise 

The head of the International Maritime Organization (IMO) expressed concern on Friday at the stalemate in the Strait of Hormuz between the US and Iran, warning of growing risks to shipping and crew safety.

At least 29 vessels have been attacked and 10 seafarers have been reported killed since the war began at the end of February. 

There are also reports of some ships being boarded and seized by Iran and US forces in the Strait, which is a key waterway for oil, gas and fertilizers.

Meanwhile inside Iran, concerns are growing over a looming shortage of essential medical supplies, despite an extended ceasefire announcement by President Trump earlier this week.

“A ceasefire does not mean the conflict is over,” said Cristhian (Cristhian) Cortez Cardoza, Deputy Regional Director for the Middle East and North Africa at UN-partner the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, IFRC.

He insisted that the consequences of weeks of “intense conflict” will continue to be felt by Iranian society “for months and years to come”.

Hundreds of Iranian health facilities have been hit, and there is increasing concern about access to key services, such as dialysis machines and prosthetic devices, because of destruction to manufacturing.

As a result of the war, the IFRC factory that supplies 60 per cent of the country’s dialysis filters only has enough raw materials to continue production for the next three months.

Gaza’s humanitarian emergency continues, warns health agency

Desperate and dangerous conditions in Gaza continue to hamper recovery efforts for the war-torn enclave’s people, the UN health agency said on Friday.

Today, more than 1,800 health facilities are partially or completely destroyed in the Strip, according to the World Health Organization (WHO). 

This includes large hospitals including Al Shifa in Gaza City along with smaller primary healthcare centres, clinics, pharmacies and laboratories.

The agency’s representative in the Occupied Palestinian Territories, Dr Reinhilde Van de Weerdt described the massive needs:

“Most Palestinian families in Gaza remain displaced. They live in tents amidst the rubble, dependent on humanitarian assistance for the most basic of their needs. And despite the ceasefire, airstrikes, shelling and gunfire continued.”

Dr Van de Weerdt described metres-high piles of rubble and widespread disease linked to rodents.

She said a lack of laboratory equipment being allowed into Gaza had left health teams “blind” and insisted that blocks must be removed on deliveries of essential medicines and supplies.

War’s toxic legacy of landmines on South Pacific islanders

More than 80 years after World War Two, the Solomon Islands remain one of the most heavily mine-contaminated places in the Pacific.

Today, the UN is supporting the process of making the islands safe again, but the risk to public health from corroding munitions is growing.

For many years, islanders have suspected that this toxic legacy has been harming them and their children, and now a UN-partnered study has found strong evidence to back this up, by confirming the presence of heavy metals such as lead, arsenic, cadmium and explosive residues.

Leading the study – funded by Japan and supported by the UN Development Programme – Dr Stacey Pizzino from the University of Queensland explained that unexploded ordnance – known as UXO – is part of daily life there:

“So UXO, you can see them in the reefs when you’re travelling, when you look down off a boat. Unexploded ordnance are used as anchors in the canoes and children are interacting with devices on a regular basis. So, in one area that we were in, we were hearing explosions on a fairly regular basis and the children were playing with the devices and harvesting the explosives out of them to create bangers, so to blow up coconuts.” 

The UN study’s findings are the first of their kind in the Pacific.

Making areas safe is a slow and complex operation because the contamination threat is vast.

But it changes everything for islanders who say they don’t have to worry for their children and can plant crops.

For UNDP, clearance is central to development; it warns that “time is running out as more hazardous chemicals leak into the environment, harming reefs, sea life and coastal communities”. 

Daniel Johnson, UN News