United Nations, 15th June, 2010 - As a major high-level meeting on the Millennium Development Goals approaches at U.N. headquarters in September, anti- poverty and human rights activists are stepping up efforts to have their voices heard.Informal hearings are taking place Monday and Tuesday among the U.N. General Assembly, civil society organisations and the private sector, in hopes of gaining many different perspectives for the September plenary meeting, which will review progress on the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).The MDGs, drawn from the Millennium Declaration adopted by all U.N. member states in 2000, are a global initiative to address poverty.They are specific and measurable goa...

13th June 2010, South Africa - Growing numbers of youngsters are putting their lives in danger to cross the South African border, drawn by the dream of sporting riches When 14-year-old Johnson left his village in Zimbabwe he had one goal in mind – to reach South Africa and the World Cup. A few weeks ago he finally made it, struggling through a hole in the barbed-wire border fence. But the horrors he encountered on his journey – the beatings and robbery by armed gangs, the crocodile-infested Limpopo and the screams of girls in the darkness of the bush – will stay with him for ever."I had nothing at home and there was no food and I heard there was going to be plenty of work in South Af...

13th June 2010, Washington - Progress in reducing maternal mortality and morbidity is still "tragically slow". Now, the United Nations has unveiled a global initiative based on government, civil society and private sector cooperation that could save the lives of up to one million women during pregnancy and childbirth.A US$20 billion funding gap in maternal and child health in the world's least developed countries means that between 350,000 and 500,000 women die each year from preventable pregnancy-related causes and complications, and another 15 million suffer from equally preventable long-term disabilities.The new Joint Action Plan for Women's and Children's Health calls on countries to pus...

10th June 2010, Barcelona,– As part of the process leading up to the UN MDG Summit on 20-22 September, the United Nations General Assembly is convening on 14-15 June interactive hearings with representatives of NGOs, civil society and the private sector. The outcomes of these hearings will be integrated into the discussions at the September MDGs+10 Summit in New York and will be issued as an Assembly document.The hearings will be a chance for civil society actors to lay down expectations and put forward recommendations on how to accelerate the progress towards the full accomplishment of the Millennium Development Goals by 2015.The office of the President of the General Assembly has also ca...

9th June 2010, Kathmandu  - With still five years left before the expiry of the Millennium Development Goals’ (MDGs) 2015 deadline to reduce under-five mortality rate by two-thirds from the 1990 level, a mid-term survey of Nepal Family Health Program (NFHP) II shows the country has already achieved the target. The MDGs are eight time-bound goals focusing on poverty and its different dimensions that all United Nations member states and several international organisations must achieve by 2015. According to the (NFHP) II, the country’s under-five mortality rate per 1,000 live births plummeted to 50 in 2009 from 162 in 1990, thus already meeting the 2015 target of bringing down the num...

6th June 2010 - The Group of Eight industrialized nations plan to invest in better health for mothers and young children in poor nations to meet faltering goals for slashing world poverty by 2015, a draft text for a G8 summit said.The five-page draft for the June 25-26 summit in Canada, dated March 12, said the "greatest economic crisis in generations" had "jeopardized our ability to meet the 2015 targets" for aiding developing nations set in 2000.It was unclear how far the text, obtained by Reuters on Monday and including references to progress toward world economic recovery, had changed in recent weeks with shockwaves from a debt crisis in Greece."We undertake to champion a new initiative ...