{"id":220926,"date":"2026-08-17T08:17:17","date_gmt":"2026-08-17T08:17:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/world-news-in-brief-afghanistan-education-myanmar-flooding-syria-recovery-homecare-workers-in-new-york-un-news\/"},"modified":"2026-08-17T08:17:17","modified_gmt":"2026-08-17T08:17:17","slug":"world-news-in-brief-afghanistan-education-myanmar-flooding-syria-recovery-homecare-workers-in-new-york-un-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/world-news-in-brief-afghanistan-education-myanmar-flooding-syria-recovery-homecare-workers-in-new-york-un-news\/","title":{"rendered":"World News in Brief: Afghanistan education, Myanmar flooding, Syria recovery, homecare workers in New York – UN News"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Five years since the Taliban seized power in Kabul, life for some Afghans has improved while many others suffer growing hardship.<\/span>
Although many families in rural Afghanistan struggle to secure food and water, the UN\u2019s aid coordination office spokesperson Olga Cherevko said on Thursday that the chief concern is the continuing ban on girls\u2019 education.
\u201cThey told me that basically they had lost hope for their daughter\u2019s future and of course for themselves,\u201d Ms. Cherevko told UN News<\/em>. \u201cThat really stayed with me because this is also a community struggling simply to make ends meet and to survive.\u201d
The senior humanitarian told UN News<\/em> that Afghan women today have fewer opportunities to earn income than men, because of increasing restrictions placed on them by the de facto authorities.
As a result, women are finding it harder to support their families, while also having to cope with reduced opportunities to participate in life outside their homes, Ms. Cherevko said.
In an assessment of the situation in Afghanistan on Thursday, the UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA<\/a>) said<\/a> that the past five years of Taliban rule had brought a reduction in conflict and \u201ctangible benefits\u201d for some.
But significant obstacles to lasting stability remain, particularly the \u201cincreasingly damaging restrictions\u201d on women and girls and ongoing terrorism concerns.
\u201cThe last five years have shown that Afghans deeply value peace and stability after decades of war,\u201d said UNAMA Officer-in-Charge Georgette Gagnon.
\u201cAfghanistan\u2019s future depends on building a society in which the rights and potential of all Afghans are realised and institutions are responsive and accountable,\u201d she added. 
The UN World Food Programme (WFP<\/a>) has launched<\/a> an emergency response operation in Myanmar, where monsoon flooding threatens to push vulnerable communities deeper into hunger.
The agency has begun distributing fortified biscuits in Laymyethna Township, Ayeyarwady region in southwestern Myanmar.
Flooding caused by heavy rainfall there over the last two weeks has breached river embankments and inundated villages.
WFP rapid assessments have indicated that more than 32,000 people across nearly 100 villages have been affected.
The 20 tons of fortified biscuits already dispatched to UN partners will provide immediate food assistance to 10,000 people. 
\u201cFlooding is a recurring threat, but this year it is impacting communities already battered by multiple underlying crises,\u201d said WFP Representative Michael Dunford.
The emergency represents a new challenge for Myanmar\u2019s people. An estimated 12.4 million people are already going hungry amid an ongoing civil war, displacement, economic hardship and high food prices.
WFP has appealed for urgent funding and sustained aid access to prevent the crisis from worsening.
A growing number of people displaced by the Syrian conflict are returning home, creating a critical juncture for the country\u2019s recovery, according to<\/a> the head of the UN refugee agency (UNHCR<\/a>) Barham Salih. 
Well over a decade of conflict in Syria claimed hundreds of thousands of lives and led to one of the most serious global displacement crises of recent years. 
Nearly four million Syrian refugees remain in T\u00fcrkiye, Lebanon, Jordan, Iraq and Egypt, and 5.5 million people are still displaced inside Syria.
\u201cSyria is at a historic turning point,\u201d said Mr. Salih. \u201cMore than three million Syrians have already returned from abroad or inside the country since December 2024, demonstrating their determination to rebuild.\u201d 
He added that \u201crecovery on this scale is a huge task, and Syria cannot do it alone. The international community must step in, and swiftly. Without this, a historic opportunity to help the country rebuild and to stabilise the region will be missed.\u201d
The Syrian Government wants a sustainable recovery, and is advocating a \u201cNo Tents, No Camps\u201d vision.
UNHCR is already collaborating closely with Syrian authorities and other development partners to address recovery needs. 
It is providing shelter rehabilitation, restoration of basic services, legal and civil documentation, housing, land and property assistance, livelihoods programmes and cash assistance.
\u201cSyrians are determined to rebuild,\u201d Mr. Salih said. \u201cThe international community must match that determination with sustained support.\u201d
Independent UN human rights experts reiterated concerns<\/a> on Thursday about what they describe as a Government-subsidised 24-hour workday system for homecare workers in New York City. 
These care workers, who are predominantly migrant women, went on a hunger strike between late July and early August to protest having to work 24 hours a day while \u2013 in practice \u2013 being undercompensated under state law.
\u201cWe are seriously concerned that the reported system may enable exploitative practices and that it has a disproportionate impact on migrant women and their families,\u201d the UN Human Rights Council<\/a>-appointed investigators said.
Under New York State\u2019s Medicaid-funded homecare system, employers must pay wages for 13 hours of a 24-hour shift, under the assumption that workers use the remaining 11 hours to eat and sleep.
The experts noted that the concentration of migrant women in homecare \u201creflects the persistent undervaluation of care work and gendered inequalities in labour markets, which may expose women to heightened risks of exploitation and abuse.\u201d
The situation for homecare workers in New York could even amount to forced labour under International Labour Organization (ILO<\/a>) standards, according to the independent experts, who receive no salary for their work from any UN entity and are not employed by any organization.
Local and state authorities must work to improve conditions, ensure access to effective remedies and reform or eliminate the 24-hour workday system in line with international human rights standards, the experts said.
\u201cHomecare workers must be able to enjoy just, favourable and safe working conditions, adequate rest, fair remuneration, protection of their rights, and access to effective remedies,\u201d they said.
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Facebook Twitter Print Email Five years since the Taliban seized power in Kabul, life for some Afghans has improved while many others suffer growing hardship.Although many families in rural Afghanistan struggle to secure food and water, the UN\u2019s aid coordination office spokesperson Olga Cherevko said on Thursday that the chief concern is the continuing ban […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":220927,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-220926","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-world","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/220926","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=220926"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/220926\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/220927"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=220926"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=220926"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=220926"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}