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UNITED NATIONS, Feb 08 (APP): ISIL/Da’esh “remains at the centre of the transnational terrorism threat”, despite the loss of its last stronghold in Syria and the death of its leader, a senior UN official has told the Security Council.

In presenting the latest UN report on ISIL/Da’esh, Vladimir Voronkov, head of the UN Office of Counter-Terrorism, urged the international community to remain united in fighting the group’s reach, which extends to Africa, Europe and Asia.

NEW YORK, February 08 (APP): More than a hundred Democratic members of the US House of Representatives have expressed strong disapproval at President Donald Trump’s plan to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

An open letter, initiated by Democratic Congressmen Alan Lowenthal and Andy Levin, warned that Trump’s plan, which he calls “deal of the century'” would pave the way for a “permanent occupation of the West Bank.”

NEW YORK, Feb 07 (APP): Pakistan’s forceful and determined campaign to highlight the grave situation in the curfew-bound Indian occupied Kashmir has led to the revival of the decades-old dispute at the United Nations, Ambassador Munir Akram told a large gathering in New York on Thursday.

“For the first time in 50 years, the Jammu Kashmir issue is now fully alive at the UN,” he said in a spirited speech at the meeting arranged by Pakistan’s Consulate General to mark Kashmir Solidarity Day.

UNITED NATIONS (AP) — The chief architect of the U.S. blueprint to resolve the decades-old conflict between Israelis and Palestinians on Thursday blamed Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas for soaring tensions and violence in the occupied West Bank since the plan’s release last week.

Jared Kushner, the son-in-law and adviser to President Donald Trump who spent nearly three years working on the plan, said leaders who are ready for a state “don’t call for days of rage and encourage their people to pursue violence if they’re not getting what they want.”

UNITED NATIONS, Feb 06 (APP): A Pakistan Army’s second Female Engagement Team (FET) has joined the United Nations Organization Stabilization Mission in the Democratic Republic of Congo (MONUSCO), according to a message received at UN Headquarters in New York.

The group comprises 21 officers and includes vocational training officers, psychologists, doctors, paramedics, operations officers and software engineers.

A team of 15 female officers is already deployed in Adikivu in South Kivu, one the provinces of D.R. Congo, a central African country.

UNITED NATIONS, Feb. 5 (Xinhua) -- The international community should make every effort to turn around the deteriorating ocean ecosystem, Peter Thomson, United Nations secretary-general's special envoy for the ocean, said on Wednesday.

"The health of the ocean is in decline. And we have to do everything possible to turn that around for obvious reasons," Thomson said while briefing reporters at the UN headquarters on the preparations for the 2020 UN Ocean Conference slated for Lisbon, Portugal, on June 2-6.

NEW YORK, Feb 05 (APP): President Donald Trump on Tuesday night told Americans that his administration was working to end the Afghan war – the longest conflict in the country’ history — and bring US troops back home, but he did not provide a timeline for the withdrawal.

He also reported progress in the ongoing peace talks with the Taliban aimed at concluding the conflict in the war-torn country. Pakistan has facilitated the talks.

THE UNITED NATIONS, February 4. /TASS/: The situation with issuance of US visas to diplomats attending UN events in New York should be normalized, United Nations Secretary General Antonio Guterres told a press conference on Tuesday in response to a TASS question.

UNITED NATIONS, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said Tuesday that the world body is committed to its established position of a two-state solution with regard to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

UNITED NATIONS (AP) — U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres warned Tuesday that “a wind of madness is sweeping the globe,” pointing to escalating conflicts from Libya and Yemen to Syria and beyond.

At a wide-ranging news conference, he said, “All situations are different but there is a feeling of growing instability and hair-trigger tensions, which makes everything far more unpredictable and uncontrollable, with a heightened risk of miscalculation.”