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Source: United Nations (video statements)

The discussion focuses on key issues affecting girls, such as their participation in social and political life, their education, eliminating all forms of violence and discrimination against them, championing their leadership in the climate crisis, and financing for the realization of their rights.

As we commemorate International Day of the Girl (IDG) 2025, we affirm that progress for girls must be led by girls. Under the theme: “We are here: Bold, Diverse, and Unstoppable – Demanding Action for Girls’ Rights,” this year’s Girls Speak Out will highlight both the challenges girls face and the leadership, resilience, and solutions they bring forward.

Hosted by the Working Group on Girls (WGG) and global partners, this 2-hour advocacy focused event is co-designed and co-led by girls. It brings together girl leaders, Member States, UN agencies, and civil society actors in a hybrid, intergenerational dialogue grounded in shared accountability and transformative action.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r2Fsier9nEg

Source: United Nations (video statements)

Press conference by Mr. Tom Fletcher, Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator will brief on Gaza.

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UN humanitarian chief Tom Fletcher welcomed the announcement of an agreement to secure a ceasefire and hostage release in Gaza, reiterating that the UN humanitarian family is “expert and determined,” with a detailed plan and tons of supplies in place.

Tom Fletcher spoke to reporters from Riyadh, Saudi Arabia via video link.

The Under-Secretary-General reiterated, “President Trump’s peace plan must be the basis for lifesaving work throughout the region. And for saving tens of thousands of lives.”

“We must seize this moment with collective will, with determination and with generosity. There must be no backsliding on the agreements that have been made,” Fletcher added.

The top UN humanitarian official laid out a plan for the first 60 days of the ceasefire. He said, “We will aim to increase the pipeline of supplies to hundreds of trucks every day. Food, we will scale up the provision of food across Gaza to reach 2.1 million people who need food aid, and around 500,000 people who need nutrition.”

“Famine must be reverted in areas where it has taken hold and prevented in others,” Fletcher stressed, adding that the UN will support bakeries, community kitchens.

“We’ll be supporting herders and fishers in restoring their livelihoods, and will be providing cash for 200,000 families to cover basic food needs and bolster their ability to cope,” the Under-Secretary-General said.

On health, Fletcher said the UN will restore the decimated health system.

He explained, “We will aim to deliver more essential medical commodities and medical supplies. We will aim to reestablish community level disease surveillance and to support emergency referrals and more medical evacuations, to supplement the workforce by deploying more emergency teams, and we will help scale up emergency care. Primary health, child health, sexual and reproductive, maternal and neonatal health, non-communicable diseases, mental health and rehabilitation.”

On water and sanitation, the humanitarian chief said, “We will help to restore the water grid, so to build up people’s reliance on water trucking, including by providing fuel, generators, chemicals, materials and supplies. We will install latrines at the household level. We will repair sewage leaks and pumping stations. We will move solid waste away from residential spaces and will provide hygiene supplies. Soap, shampoo, laundry detergent, sanitary pads.”

Moving onto education, Fletcher noted the UN will reopen temporary learning spaces to provide activities for 700,000 school aged children, and will provide them with learning materials and school supplies.

The top UN humanitarian official outlined ten key requirements to make the UN plan successful, including sustained fuel supply, multiple aid corridors, restored infrastructure, protection for humanitarian workers, and adequate funding.

He noted that at the moment, only 28 percent of the $4 billion needed for the 2025 flash appeal for these areas for the OPT has been funded, urging “every government, every State, every individual” to make “generosity count, to help us to deliver, to help us to save so many lives in the Gaza Strip, to respond to this plan at the scale required and with the level of kindness and generosity that, frankly, the world owes right now.”

Asked about working with the Israeli authority, Fletcher said, “We’ve worked with the Israeli authorities in the past, as we did during the 42 days of ceasefire back at the beginning of the year to delivery aid on a massive scale, 500, 600 trucks going in every day.”

“We have the muscle memory between us all,” the Under-Secretary-General said, “if we have the right spirit of dialog, cooperation and we can work to rebuild trust, then I’m confident that we can save lives at scale.”

“That lifesaving work, getting the hostages home, the aid in is something that surely we can all agree on. And that’s the spirit in which I’m ready to work,” Fletcher concluded.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5HememNRxbk

Source: United Nations (video statements)

Congratulations to Olukemi Ibikunle of #Nigeria 🇳🇬 for winning the 2025 United Nations Trailblazer Award for Women Justice and Corrections Officers!

Serving with the UN Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Olukemi has consistently broken gender barriers through her leadership as the Unit Engineer, thriving in a traditionally male-dominated field by delivering high-impact projects. She focuses her work on reshaping prison strategies to promote safety, dignity, and rehabilitation.

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/9Hc3XUSX36c

Source: United Nations (video statements)

Press Conference by Karla Quintana, Assistant Secretary-General and Head of the Independent Institution on Missing Persons in the Syrian Arab Republic, on the situation in Syria.

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The Head of the Independent Institution on Missing Persons in Syria (IIMP), Karla Quintana, said, “clarifying the fate of the missing is not only a matter of personal closure, it is also a corner store of serious path toward justice, reconciliation and reform.”

Addressing the press, Quintana said, “Everyone has someone or knows someone that is missing in Syria. We search for everyone who is missing in Syria or in the context related to Syria, regardless of their affiliation, their nationality, their ethnicity, or the context in which they went missing. The institution is a product of a collective action led by families – especially women – civil society and Member States. A continued, multilateral support for the independent institution is essential.”

She reported that IIMP is currently investigating “forcible disappearances by the former regime, missing children placed in orphanages by security services, the so ‘called Security Placements’, as well as the disappearances by Daesh, missing migrants and asylum seekers and new disappearances post December 2024 especially in Latakia, Tartus and the As-Suwayda governorates. This does not mean that we are not working on other disappearances.”

She noted, “Thanks to the work of Syrian civil society, before December 8, we had a figure of around 130,000 people missing in Syria. Two months ago, the National Commission for the search of the missing issued a statement where it stated that they thought there were in between 130,000 and 300, 000 persons missing in Syria.”

She concluded, “It is clear from the Syrian voices that there are at least two things that every Syrian has in common: the will, the hope and the love to rebuild their country and the hope to form to find their loved ones. Clarifying the fate of the missing is not only a matter of personal closure, it is also a corner store of serious path toward justice, reconciliation and reform. Looking for the missing everywhere is an ethical and collective endeavor that requires multilateralism, coordination and trust.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pun_u4zMUnM