New York

June 23 (Reuters) - Advisers to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) are set to meet on Wednesday to assess the possibility of a link between rare cases of heart inflammation and the mRNA COVID-19 vaccines from Pfizer (PFE.N) and partner BioNTech and from Moderna (MRNA.O).

The CDC has been investigating cases of heart inflammation mainly in young men for several months. The Israeli health ministry earlier this month said it saw a possible link between such cases and Pfizer's COVID-19 vaccine.

UNITED NATIONS, June 22 (Xinhua) -- The UN secretary-general's special representative for Afghanistan warned on Tuesday that the situation on the ground in the country is dire.

"I cannot overstate to the council my concern regarding the present situation in Afghanistan. All of the major trends -- politics, security, the peace process, the economy, the humanitarian emergency, and COVID -- all of these trends are negative or stagnant," Deborah Lyons, the top UN envoy for Afghanistan, told the Security Council in a briefing.

NEW YORK (AP) — Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams appeared to take a fragile lead Tuesday in New York City’s Democratic mayoral primary, but it could be weeks before it becomes clear who is actually on top in the first citywide election to use ranked choice voting.

As ballot counting began Tuesday, a plurality of Democrats ranked Adams as their first choice in the race.

UNITED NATIONS, June 22 (NNN-AGENCIES) — Violence against children in war-torn countries soared in 2020, exacerbated by the Covid-19 pandemic, according to an annual United Nations report.
 
Child abductions increased 90 percent while rape and sexual abuse of children rose 70 percent compared to the previous year, said the report, signed by UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres.
 
“The overall number of grave violations remained alarmingly high at 26,425,” the report said.
 

UNITED NATIONS, June 21 (Xinhua) -- UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Monday called on all stakeholders to ramp up action toward Sustainable Development Goal 7 (SDG7) -- affordable and clean energy.

"We are running far behind in the race against time to achieve Sustainable Development Goal 7 by 2030, and net-zero emissions by mid-century. Achieving universal energy access is crucial for delivering on the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development," he said in a video message to the opening of the Ministerial Thematic Forums of the High-level Dialogue on Energy.

NEW YORK, June 22 (Xinhua) -- U.S. ban on Chinese makers of surveillance cameras and other hardware is diverting focus from the future and diminishing America's ability to remain a global technology leader, said an opinion piece published on Bloomberg's website.

Chinese companies "are not standing still," Anjani Trivedi, a columnist with Bloomberg, written in the article published by Bloomberg on Saturday.

"They are developing even more futuristic technologies that will leave American competitors scrambling," it added.

UNITED NATIONS, Jun 21 (APP): UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has reminded the international community of its duty to help refugees rebuild their lives after a particularly difficult year for so many.

In a message marking World Refugee Day, he appealed for greater empathy for all those who’ve had to flee conflict, climate shocks, and harassment, through no fault of their own, saying that the pandemic had wiped out refugees’ livelihoods, and led to stigmatization and vilification.

United Nations, Jun 21 (PTI) India received USD 64 billion in Foreign Direct Investment in 2020, the fifth largest recipient of inflows in the world, according to a UN report which said the COVID-19 second wave in the country weighs heavily on the country's overall economic activities but its strong fundamentals provide optimism for the medium term.

NEW YORK, June 18 (Reuters) - The United Nations General Assembly on Friday called for a stop to the flow of arms to Myanmar and urged the military to respect November election results and release political detainees, including leader Aung San Suu Kyi.

The General Assembly adopted a resolution with the support of 119 countries several months after the military overthrew Aung San Suu Kyi's elected government in a Feb. 1 coup. Belarus requested the text be put to a vote and was the only country to oppose it, while 36 abstained, including China and Russia.

NEW YORK, June 18 (Xinhua) -- The lab leak theory about the current COVID-19 pandemic just doesn't hold up, reported U.S. news publication Foreign Policy recently.

"While the theory was reported, many media outlets also dismissed it as conspiracy mongering. The possibility of a routine lab accident became caught up in the theories about bio-weapons and germ warfare," the publication said in a report released on Tuesday.