SUDAN
Our humanitarian colleagues said they’re deeply concerned by the intensifying drone attacks on civilian infrastructure in Port Sudan, in the east of the country. Early this morning, drone attacks reportedly struck the airport area, a fuel storage facility and a power transformer.
While no UN personnel or facilities were directly affected by the strikes, OCHA said that the latest violence poses a growing risk to the safety of humanitarian staff and operations with flights of the UN Humanitarian Air Service both to and from Port Sudan still on hold.
Elsewhere in the country, prolonged power outages due to drone attacks targeting power stations and facilities continue to disrupt civilian life. This is the case in Northern State, where a one-month power blackout prevented farmers from running electrical water pumps, leading to the destruction of more than 84 square kilometres of crops. And in River Nile State, the targeted destruction of power infrastructure has led to severe water supply shortages.
Despite hostilities, we continue to provide assistance to the most vulnerable people. In East Darfur, humanitarian organizations are mobilizing aid for 35,000 people in the town of Ed Daein who fled there from Khartoum and Aj Jazirah States. And in Kassala State, we are scaling up water, sanitation and hygiene efforts and public health outreach to curb the spread of hepatitis E.
CHAD
And staying in the region, the UN Refugee Agency is gravely concerned by the rapidly increasing number of Sudanese refugees crossing into eastern Chad. Nearly 20,000 people – mostly women and children – have arrived there in the past two weeks alone.
This sudden influx reflects the escalating violence in Sudan’s North Darfur region, particularly in and around El Fasher, which is triggering mass displacement. Refugees arriving in Chad report that over 10,000 people are still en route, trying to reach the border to escape the violence.
A rapid protection assessment by UNHCR and its partners indicates that 76 per cent of the newly arrived refugees were subjected to serious protection incidents, including extortion, theft and sexual violence.
Chad already hosts 1.3 million refugees, including 794,000 arrivals from Sudan since the conflict started more than two years ago. While the country continues to show remarkable solidarity in hosting refugees, it cannot bear this burden alone.
UNHCR urges the international community to urgently step up support for the response. Only 20 per cent of the $409 million required to respond to the refugee crisis in Chad has been funded.
SOUTH SUDAN
Our peacekeeping colleagues in South Sudan tell us of continued air strikes in Fangak, a remote county in Jonglei state. According to reports received by the Mission last night, further aerial bombardments have allegedly taken place in and around New Fangak town, residential areas near the Phow river, and other locations.
The Mission is working with all partners to verify civilian displacement figures, facilitate assistance for communities who have been affected by these events, and reduce tensions. Guang Cong, the Mission’s Deputy Special Representative, said that such attacks contravene the Revitalized Peace Agreement and severely undermine efforts to build lasting peace in the country. He called on involved parties to prioritize civilian protection by pursuing an immediate ceasefire.
YEMEN
Hans Grundberg, the UN Special Envoy for Yemen, said that the aerial attack carried out by Ansar Allah on Ben Gurion Airport in Israel, followed by strikes in response by Israel on Sana’a Airport and Hudaydah port in Yemen, mark a grave escalation in an already fragile and volatile regional context.
Mr. Grundberg once again urges all stakeholders to exercise the utmost restraint and refrain from escalatory actions that risk inflicting further suffering on civilians. It is imperative that all actors uphold their obligations under international law to protect civilians and civilian infrastructure.
A return to dialogue is the only sustainable path towards ensuring lasting safety and security for Yemen and the broader region, the Special Envoy said.
OCCUPIED PALESTINIAN TERRITORY
Turning to Gaza, the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs continues to warn of a deepening catastrophe driven by relentless hostilities and a total blockade on humanitarian and commercial supplies, which is now in its third month.
OCHA stresses that under international humanitarian law, civilians must be protected, and their essential needs – including food, shelter, water and healthcare – must be met, wherever they are in Gaza and whether they move or stay.
Yesterday, the Palestine Red Crescent Society reported that all emergency and primary healthcare centres in Rafah are now out of service due to ongoing hostilities. Across Gaza, 13 of 29 Red Crescent clinics have closed. The remaining clinics are barely functional and face severe shortages.
As we said yesterday, access to fuel remains a critical concern. Without fuel, health, water, sanitation, and communications services are at risk of complete collapse.
Today, a UN team retrieved a small amount of fuel from a station in Deir al Balah, after the Israeli authorities facilitated our colleagues’ efforts to reach it. This limited quantity will be distributed to desalination plants. However, OCHA says that the Israeli authorities continue to routinely deny our access to larger, urgently needed fuel reserves in areas such as Rafah.
With stocks dwindling over the past nine weeks, our humanitarian partners have gone above and beyond to try and sustain life-saving support, including the distribution of hot meals, water, shelter materials, hygiene kits, and health and nutrition services and consultations. But time is running out. Humanitarian operations are on the verge of shutting down unless Member States with influence press Israel to allow the immediate entry of essential humanitarian supplies, at a scale that meets the needs of all civilians.
Moving to the West Bank, OCHA warns of worsening conditions due to violence by Israeli forces and settlers, as well as of other coercive practices targeting Palestinian communities.
On Wednesday, Israeli forces demolished more than 30 structures in Khallet Athaba, a hamlet in Hebron governorate, displacing nearly a dozen families – about 50 people. This constitutes most of the structures in the community and marks the third and largest demolition there since February. The area is designated by Israel as a military training zone.
Yesterday, Israeli forces began demolishing six homes in Nur Shams refugee camp in Tulkarm, affecting 17 families. The homes are among more than 100 structures slated for demolition, following an Israeli notice issued at the start of the month.
Today, more than 50 other families in the camp were given brief windows to collect belongings ahead of imminent demolitions of their homes. There has been a strong push for Palestinians living in this area to leave their homes, once again raising concerns about the risks of forcible transfer of the population.
DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF THE CONGO / HUMANITARIAN
In the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs says that the humanitarian situation continues to deteriorate in the east of the country, as armed violence continues to drive thousands of people from their homes, particularly in South and North Kivu.
In South Kivu, armed clashes continued yesterday in multiple areas of Walungu, Kalehe, and Uvira territories, compounding an already dire displacement crisis.
While exact displacement figures remain to be verified, our humanitarian partners estimate that ongoing fighting has displaced more than 19,000 people in the Bunyakiri region in Kalehe territory since 23 April.
Human rights violations continue to be perpetrated in Kalehe territory. Local humanitarian sources report that four girls were abducted and raped in the Bunyakiri region between 29 April and 4 May, bringing the total number of documented cases of sexual violence to at least 13 since February 2025 in this area.
In North Kivu, an escalation of fighting since 2 May across Lubero territory has displaced more than 30,000 people to nearby areas, according to local partners.
Meanwhile, our humanitarian partners began a three-day operation yesterday to provide food and cash assistance to nearly 15,000 displaced people in collective centres in the towns of Goma and Sake in Masisi territory.
A humanitarian assessment conducted in April among displaced households in the collective centres in Goma and Sake revealed that 90 per cent of displaced families want to return home, but they have requested guarantees of security and support for transport.
DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF THE CONGO
As the humanitarian crisis in the Democratic Republic of the Congo continues to worsen, the UN Refugee Agency, and 107 of its partners are appealing for $781 million to continue providing urgent and life-saving support to more than 1 million Congolese refugees and asylum-seekers in neighbouring countries and over 1 million people in local communities across seven countries.
The updated Regional Refugee Response Plan for the DRC situation highlights the deterioration of conditions in eastern DRC, where the surge in armed violence has continued to displace communities at an unprecedented rate since January this year.
Since then, nearly 150,000 people have fled the DRC, with the majority seeking refuge in Burundi and Uganda.
Displacement inside the DRC has also reached unprecedented levels. By the end of 2024, an estimated 7.8 million people were internally displaced – the highest figure on record.
LIBYA
The UN Support Mission in Libya, UNSMIL, is alarmed at the video circulating on social media purporting to show House of Representatives member, Ibrahim Al-Dersi, detained and chained with visible signs of torture.
The Mission has requested UN digital forensic experts to assess the authenticity of the video. The Mission also calls again on Libyan authorities to immediately initiate a fully independent investigation into the enforced disappearance of Mr. Al-Dersi, who has been missing since 16 May 2024. UNSMIL reiterates that it stands ready to support an independent investigation into the disappearance and allegations of torture.
UNSMIL reminds all relevant authorities that arbitrary detentions, abductions, torture, enforced disappearances and deaths in custody are serious human rights violations and may constitute international crimes that can be prosecuted by the International Criminal Court. Libyan authorities must ensure these practices immediately cease and that perpetrators are brought to justice.
UKRAINE
From Ukraine, our colleagues at the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs report that intense airstrikes across the country continued yesterday and today, with at least eight civilians killed and more than 40 others injured due to shelling in the north-east, east and south of the country, according to local authorities.
The attacks damaged homes, marketplaces and critical infrastructure in the regions of Sumy, Kharkiv, Donetsk, Odesa and Kherson.
Humanitarian teams responded swiftly following these new attacks, providing emergency shelter materials, psychosocial support and hygiene supplies to affected families.
Attacks have also heavily impacted access to water in the Donetsk region. Shelling disrupted water supplies from two of three key water pipelines, while in Donetsk City, water reportedly remains available only a few hours on specific days.
Aid remains critical to support access to water, sanitation and hygiene. Despite funding shortfalls, in the first quarter of 2025, our humanitarian partners supported 1.8 million people across Ukraine with assistance related to these issues.
SECURITY COUNCIL
The Security Council began a debate on Bosnia and Herzegovina this morning. The High Representative for Bosnia and Herzegovina, Christian Schmidt, briefed the Council.
HUMAN DEVELOMENT REPORT
Human development progress is experiencing an unprecedented slowdown, according to a new report released today by the United Nations Development Programme.
The 2025 Human Development Report says that, instead of a sustained recovery following the period of exceptional crises of 2020-2021, progress has been unexpectedly weak. Excluding those crisis years, the meagre rise in global human development projected in this year’s report is the smallest increase since 1990. Projections for 2024 reveal stalled progress on the Human Development Index in all regions across the world.
The report – titled, "A matter of choice: people and possibilities in the age of Artificial Intelligence (AI)" - shows how Artificial Intelligence (AI) could reignite development. In a new survey, half of respondents worldwide think that their jobs could be automated. An even larger share—six in ten— expect AI to impact their employment positively, creating opportunities in jobs that may not even exist today.
SCIENCE, TECHNOLOGY AND INNOVATION
I want to flag that the Science, Technology and Innovation Forum starts today. It is convened annually by the President of the Economic and Social Council to foster global collaboration on science, technology, and innovation in support of the Sustainable Development Goals. And this year’s forum is being co-chaired by the Permanent Missions of Morocco and Finland.
