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UNITED NATIONS, Mar 15 (APP): The UN General Assembly Tuesday adopted, by consensus, a resolution, introduced by Pakistan on behalf of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), that proclaims March 15 as International Day to Combat Islamophobia, saying it was aimed at promoting a culture of tolerance ad peace globally.

The resolution was sponsored by 57 members of the OIC, and eight other countries, including China and Russia.

NEW YORK, March 14 (Xinhua) -- The fatal overdose rate among Black people surpassed that for white people in the United States in 2020, the first time since 1999, a recent study showed.

Over 15,200 overdoses were reported among Black people in the year, more than double the number from four years earlier, according to data published in March by researchers from the University of California, Los Angeles in the medical journal JAMA Psychiatry.

UNITED NATIONS, March 14 (Xinhua) -- UN General Assembly President Abdulla Shahid said Monday that the next UN secretary-general should be female.

Just four women have been elected president of the General Assembly in its 76 sessions. However, no woman has ever been chosen as the secretary-general. This needs to be corrected, Shahid told the opening of the 66th session of the Commission on the Status of Women.

UNITED NATIONS (AP) — Women and girls pay the highest price in all crises and conflicts from Myanmar and Afghanistan to the Sahel and Haiti, and “the horrifying war in Ukraine now joins that list,” the head of the U.N. women’s agency said Monday.

Undersecretary-General Sima Bahous told the opening session of the Commission on the Status of Women’s annual meeting that with every passing day the war is damaging the lives, hopes and futures of Ukrainian women and girls.

NEW YORK (AP) — Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan is planning trips to Iowa and New Hampshire. Rep. Adam Kinzinger, R-Ill., is considering a rough timeline for a potential presidential announcement. And allies of Rep. Liz Cheney, R-Wyo., are openly talking up her White House prospects.

More than two years before the next presidential election, a shadow primary is already beginning to take shape among at least three fierce Republican critics of former President Donald Trump to determine who is best positioned to occupy the anti-Trump lane in 2024.

UNITED NATIONS, Mar 13 (APP): In a phone call with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres Sunday discussed various ongoing initiatives to end the Russia-Ukraine conflict, now in its third week, according to a UN spokesman.

Guterres “expressed his appreciation for President Erdogan’s mediation efforts between Russia and Ukraine,” the spokesman said in a statement issued in New York.
“They discussed the different ongoing initiatives to bring an end to the conflict, as peace is the most important goal,” he said.

UNITED NATIONS (AP) — The United States accused Russia of using a U.N. Security Council meeting Friday for “lying and spreading disinformation” as part of a potential false-flag operation by Moscow for the use of chemical or biological agents in Ukraine.

U.S. Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield said Russia was playing out a scenario put forth in the council last month by U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken — that President Vladimir Putin would “fabricate allegations about chemical or biological weapons to justify its own violent attacks against the Ukrainian people.”

NEW YORK (AP) — A man stabbed two employees inside the Museum of Modern Art in New York on Saturday afternoon, leaping over a reception desk to attack them after he was denied entrance for previous incidents of disorderly conduct, authorities said.

Police said the two employees were stabbed multiple times and both were in stable condition at Bellevue Hospital later Saturday. People posting accounts to social media said museumgoers ran for the exits in confusion and chaos after the stabbing.

NEW YORK, March 12. /TASS/: Head of Instagram Adam Mosseri has confirmed that it will be blocked in Russia on March 14, according to his Twitter page.

"On Monday, Instagram will be blocked in Russia," Mosseri stated, castigating this decision as wrong. "This decision will cut 80 mln in Russia off from one another, and from the rest of the world as about 80% of people in Russia follow an Instagram account outside their country," the head of Instagram emphasized.

UNITED NATIONS, Mar 12 (NNN-AGENCIES) – UN Secretary-General, Antonio Guterres, yesterday called for a ceasefire in Syria, in a statement marking 11 years of “brutal fighting” in the conflict-torn nation.

“We cannot fail the Syrian people. The conflict must cease. International humanitarian law must be respected,” said the UN chief.

“I call on all parties to meaningfully engage in the UN-facilitated political process, and appeal for further support to scale up the humanitarian response. We must choose peace,” the secretary-general added.