UN Daily Press Briefing: Gaza Aid, Sudan Conflict, South Sudan Refugees & More (June 4, 2025)

Senior Personnel Appointment

• 🚀 Major General Diodato Abagnara of Italy has been appointed as the new Head of Mission and Force Commander for the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL).
• 👏 He succeeds Lieutenant General Aroldo Lázaro Sáenz of Spain and brings over 36 years of military service to the role.

Occupied Palestinian Territory (Gaza)

• ⚠️ The Emergency Relief Coordinator urged Israel to open all crossings into Gaza and lift restrictions on aid, highlighting that deliberate choices have deprived two million people of essentials.
• 🏥 Over 100,000 people have been forced to flee in North Gaza and Gaza governorates in the past three weeks, leading to the suspension of operations at medical facilities, with not a single hospital remaining functional in North Gaza.
• 🚚 Efforts to deliver aid through Kerem Shalom crossing face significant hurdles, with many truckloads denied access, impacting critical interventions like trucking water and retrieving fuel.
• 🚨 The UN Security Council met to discuss the situation in Gaza, with the Secretary-General emphasizing the need for a strong, unified voice calling for an end to the conflict, full humanitarian access, and the release of hostages.

Sudan and South Sudan

• 🌍 Conflict-related displacement and a cholera outbreak are increasing humanitarian needs in Sudan, with nearly 9,700 people displaced in Khartoum state alone and over 9,000 fleeing Debe de Debbat town.
• 💧 While cholera cases are falling in Khartoum, they are increasing in River Nile State, with over 180 cases and four deaths reported in the past two weeks, underscoring the cross-regional spread.
• 🆘 Thousands of displaced people returning to Blue Nile state require urgent assistance, lacking food, clean water, healthcare, and shelter, while insecurity and funding shortfalls undermine the response.
• ✈️ In South Sudan, funding cuts have halted services for over a million refugees and returnees who have fled Sudan, leaving many stranded in overcrowded transit shelters.

Other Global Updates

• ⚖️ The High Commissioner for Human Rights called for the sealing of detention facilities in Libya due to documented human rights violations, including torture and enforced disappearances.
• 🌧️ Intense monsoon rains in Bangladesh have triggered landslides and floods in Rohingya refugee camps in Cox's Bazaar, impacting nearly 16,000 people, with emergency response underway.
• 🕊️ UN agencies and NGOs in Yemen echoed the call for the immediate and unconditional release of detained personnel from UN and other organizations.
• 🧒 The International Day of Innocent Children Victims of Aggression was observed, highlighting the horrors faced by children in conflicts worldwide.
• 🏢 The UN is reviewing office space leases in New York to address a liquidity crisis, with plans to progressively end leases in rented commercial buildings.