Breaking news and news from the UN General Assembly

Some leaders fear that Russia’s war in Ukraine has crowded out other issues of global importance, such as the climate crisis. “This would have been a climate UNGA, but Russia has taken care of that with its invasion of Ukraine,” a diplomat told CNN. “It takes up a lot of space,” said Stefan Dujarric, a spokesman for the UN secretary-general, during a news conference on Monday. “Because we know that the war in Ukraine is having a global impact on food, on cereals, on the energy crisis. It is having a knock-on effect in the fight against climate change as, due to the energy crisis, we see member states going back to polluting energy sources.” “However, it does not prevent the secretary general from raising all these other issues,” she added. But US Ambassador to the UN Linda Thomas-Greenfield stressed the need to take a broad view, telling reporters on Friday that “next week will not be dominated by Ukraine, but we will not ignore Ukraine and that horrible war is raging in Ukraine, we cannot ignore the rest of the world,” he added. Food security is another hot topic for the global forum, with the world economy hit hard by the pandemic, inflation and struggling supply chains. US Secretary of State Antony Blinken is expected to chair a meeting on food during the high-level week. “What we’re hoping to do is really bring the world together to address all the issues related to food insecurity. So it’s bringing both the South and countries, developing countries and donor countries together in the room to address these issues.” said US Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield.