Floating in near zero-gravity, 400 kilometres above the Pacific Ocean and flying at over 28,000 kilometres per hour, the six crew members onboard the International Space Station (ISS) joined the key United Nations forum on outer space affairs via video link on Wednesday, to discuss the importance of working together.

NASA astronauts Drew Feustel, Ricky Arnold and Serena Auñón-Chancellor; Russian cosmonauts Oleg Artemyev and Sergey Prokopyev; together with European Space Agency astronaut Alexander Gerst, hovered in front of their national flags, as an ecstatic audience cheered and took “selfies” with them on screens in the main hall where the Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space was meeting in Vienna, as part of the UNISPACE+50 forum.

Cosmonaut Oleg Artemyev delivered a very simple yet powerful message to the UN forum.

“Peace for our planet,” he declared, as the audience erupted in applause.

Commander Feustel highlighted the importance of everyone having access to space:

“I hope that as we continue forward as an international group, that we will all put our common thoughts and rational thoughts” in how space is used, together, he said, recognizing “that the goal should not necessarily be to dominate space, but to help facilitate access so that we as a species – not just as individual nations or individual people – can continue on into the future.”

With their feet planted firmly on the ground in the Austrian capital, UN Office for Outer Space Affairs (UNOOSA) Director Simonetta Di Pippo, together with UN Champion for Space, Scott Kelly (himself a former NASA astronaut), and NASA Chief Scientist Jim Green, led the discussion.

UN News/Runa A

Astronaut Serena Auñón-Chancellor (arms raised) acknowledges the audience ovation.

‘Don’t be afraid – ask questions’

Explore … discover and that is the best way for young girls and women to get interested in STEM fields – Astronaut Serena Auñón-Chancellor

Astronaut Serena Auñón-Chancellor had some advice for young women and girls wishing to pursue careers in the STEM fields – science, technology, engineer and mathematics – who are feeling ambivalent about promoting themselves, and a career in space science. 

“I tell them…bother people” she said. “Bother them if you are interested in their work and research, get them to tell you about it, ask questions … explore, discover and that is the best way for young girls and women to get interested in STEM fields.”

International cooperation in space

In response a question on the importance of international cooperation in space exploration, Commander Feustel, explained that such partnership not only helps keep costs down, but also helps develop technologies and innovations which are vital for space exploration.

“All of our partners have a great experience in space and they are all very different experiences. What we are doing right now requires all these different assets come together,” he said.

New equipment and technologies

Cosmonaut Sergey Prokopyev told the awe-struck audience – jaws dropping in disbelief – about some of the new technologies being used or tested in space.

He spoke about the urine processor onboard the ISS; a vital piece of equipment that turns urine and body fluids like sweat, into potable water.

The Russian Cosmonaut also highlighted the ICARUS initiative.

“This is a very interesting experiment and equipment … this will help people understand habitation patterns of wild animals,” he said.

ICARUS stands for International Cooperation for Animal Research Using Space.

UN News/Vibhu Mishra

Astronaut Ricky Arnold grabs the mic before it drifts too far away.

Preparing the ground-work for traveling into the Solar System

Answering a question on how the work onboard the ISS improves live back home on earth, Astronaut Ricky Arnold cited examples ranging from gaining a better understanding on how the planet functions, and developing new medicines, to preparing the ground work on how the human body reacts to conditions in space.

“Our bodies change and if we are going to go out into the Solar System and be a multiplanetary species … we have to understand how these changes occur and how we can protect the people we send out to explore the Solar System,” he said.

Future in space depends on partnerships

German astronaut Alexander Gerst took a question on how countries that are new to space, could engage in exploration that would benefit the world.

We built the International Space Station with modules from different countries … more than 100,000 people built this – German astronaut Alexander Gerst

The “key” to answering that, he said, was to look at the International Space Station.

“We built the International Space Station with modules from different countries … more than 100,000 people built this.”

Future success in space depends on partnerships, he said, suggesting that new countries can partner with experienced ones to build new modules, for example, and continue to develop the International Space Station for more advanced undertakings.

UN News/Runa A

Astronauts wave bye before signing off from the video conference call.

UNISPACE+50

The live video conference was a part of the high-level segment of UNISPACE+50, a forum commemorating the fiftieth anniversary of the ground-breaking 1968 UN Conference on the Exploration and Peaceful Uses of Outer Space, or UNISPACE for short.

The call, routed through NASA’s Johnson Space Center, was the first time since 1995 that space travelers had been part of a UN event. That year, as part of the fiftieth anniversary of the United Nations, then-Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali, talked via video to the crew of the second Shuttle-Mir Docking mission.

In 1962, the General Assembly adopted a resolution calling on all Member States to regard astronauts as envoys of all humankind in outer space, and give them all the help and support that that entails.

UN News is on location in Vienna covering UNISPACE+50 and its associated events. Follow us at @UN_News_Centre for news and highlights.

The siege of eastern Ghouta in war-torn Syria, which lasted more than five years, has been labelled “barbaric and medieval” — “amounting” to war crimes, and crimes against humanity, a high-level UN inquiry said on Wednesday.

In a 23-page report on the siege mounted against the densely populated suburb close to the capital Damascus, the Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Syrian Arab Republic details the events that led to its recapture by pro-Government forces in April this year, following a “dramatically escalating” military campaign.

Neighbourhoods suffered aerial and ground bombardments “which claimed the lives of hundreds of Syrian men, women and children”, the report notes, with “numerous homes, markets and hospitals all but razed to the ground”.

These indiscriminate, “widespread and systematic bombardments” and the act of deliberately attacking protected objects, amounted to war crimes, it continues.

Commenting on the events in eastern Ghouta, Commission of Inquiry Chair, Paulo Pinheiro, condemned the civilian deaths as “abhorrent”.

In addition to the deadly violence they faced, families were denied food and medicine, the veteran rights expert noted, before adding that “no warring party acted to protect the civilian population” during the last phase of the siege.

According to the report, between February and April this year, besieged armed groups and terrorist organizations based inside eastern Ghouta “relentlessly fired” unguided mortars into Damascus city and nearby areas, “killing and maiming” hundreds of Syrian civilians.

Insisting that “there can be no justification” for the indiscriminate shelling of inhabited areas, Commissioner Hanny Megally said that this, too, amounted to a war crime.

According to the report, by the time Government forces declared eastern Ghouta recaptured on 14 April, some 140,000 individuals had fled their homes and up to 50,000 were evacuated to Idlib and Aleppo governorates.

“Tens of thousands” of people have been unlawfully interned by Government forces in what the report’s authors call “managed sites” in rural Damascus, which includes Ghouta.

Their number includes women and children, which is “reprehensible”, Commissioner Karen Koning AbuZayd said.

The report is scheduled to be formally presented next week, on 26 June, during an interactive dialogue at the current session of the Human Rights Council.

Protecting refugee children is “a test of our shared humanity,” two top United Nations officials said on Wednesday.

The statement by Filippo Grandi, UN High Commissioner for Refugees, and Henrietta Fore, Executive Director of the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) came in an editorial published on the website for CNN, the US-based cable and online news network.

Wednesday is World Refugee Day, which is marked annually, each 20 June, when the UN system highlights the strength, courage and perseverance of refugees across the world, and calls on the public to show support for families forced to flee.

“Here is our call to action: refugee children, whether on our doorsteps, or in remote borderlands, must be protected, sheltered and equipped for their futures,” wrote the agency chiefs.

“Our ability to make a difference in their lives – between despair and hope, and being left behind and building a future – is a test of our shared humanity.”

Globally, more than 68 million people have been forcibly displaced from their homes, with children making up more than half the world’s refugee population.

Our ability to make a difference in their lives – between despair and hope, and being left behind and building a future – is a test of our shared humanity – Filippo Grandi, UNHCR and Henrietta Fore, UNICEF

Furthermore, nearly 174,000 refugee and asylum-seeking children have been separated from their families or forced to flee on their own.

With conflicts multiplying and intensifying in recent years, thus creating millions more refugees and displaced people, “governments seem to have overlooked their duty of care to children,” the UN agency chiefs stated, adding “perhaps it is because the statistics can be so staggering that they harden us to the human suffering that underpins them.”

They stressed that all “children on the move” should receive the same care and compassion as any other child.

“Children are first and foremost children – and regardless of their nationality, their legal status, or that of their parents, their welfare and rights must be at the center of our actions,” they said.

The UN officials recalled the “unthinkable suffering” refugee children endure in their quest for safety, only to face hostility and rejection when they arrive.

“Turned away by border guards and impenetrable barbed wire fences, kept in detention centers, or separated from their parents – the violence that propelled them from their countries is perpetuated by the hostile reception they receive,” they said.

However, if young refugees are provided with a safe environment, an education and opportunities, they will flourish and contribute to their host countries and help rebuild their homelands when conditions allow, the UN officials added.

They looked to the implementation of the Global Compact on Refugees, which will be presented to world leaders meeting at the UN later this year.

It calls for investments in communities hosting refugees, fair and humane asylum policies, and more opportunities for resettlement and family reunification, among other proposals.

International reaction to the United States decision to withdraw from the UN Human Rights Council continued on Wednesday with the President of the Geneva-based assembly confirming that the election of a new Member State would take place “as soon as possible” to fill the vacant seat.

The development follows an announcement on Tuesday by Nikki Haley, US Ambassador to the UN, that the US was pulling out after repeated warnings during the past year that the Council was allegedly biased against Israel and in need of major reform.

Speaking hours after the US move, Vojislav Šuc said that the poll would take place once US “notification of withdrawal is formally received”.

Members are elected by majority vote at the UN General Assembly in New York and Mr. Šuc told the 47-State body in Geneva that he intended to “be in touch” with its President, Miroslav Lajčák, about choosing a replacement to complete the unfinished US term.

Commenting on the development, Mr. Lajčák’s office issued a statement noting his regret at the move.

The US had traditionally played a “strong human rights advocacy role” across the world, the text explained, before adding that in view of today’s global challenges, the President of the General Assembly “believes that our collective work to ensure a better world will benefit from more dialogue and collaboration — not less”.

Also reacting to the US decision, UN human rights chief Zeid Ra’ad Al-Hussein described it as “disappointing, if not really surprising”.

The US should be “stepping up, not stepping back” given the state of human rights today, the UN High Commissioner tweeted, echoing comments by UN Secretary-General António Guterres that he would have “much preferred” the US to remain.

At the start of the Council’s thirty-eighth session on Monday — which is also Zeid’s last session before his mandate ends — he defended multilateralism and rounded on the rise of what he described as “chauvinistic nationalism” as the greatest threat to the world.

Too many Governments had failed to make a success of the UN by “feigning a commitment to the common effort”, the High Commissioner continued, before highlighting rights concerns in more than 20 countries, including Israel and the US.

Under General Assembly rules, membership of the Human Rights Council is open to all UN Member States.

It is based on fair geographical representation and members serve for three years at a time. They are not eligible for immediate re-election after two consecutive terms.

The US was first elected to the Council in 2009, three years after the Geneva body was created by the General Assembly as the organization’s principal political human rights body, replacing the Commission on Human Rights.

It is only halfway through its current term.

The health and wellbeing of women and children in North Korea has improved slightly in recent years but “urgent” challenges remain in rural areas, the UN Children’s Fund, UNICEF, said on Wednesday.

Analysing information gathered from more than 8,500 households across the country, known officially as the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, on everything from child labour, to the kind of fuel that families use to stay warm, the agency says that it has built up a “snapshot” of the lives of ordinary citizens in DPRK.

According to the DPRK survey, nearly 40,000 severely malnourished children received treatment in 2017 and more than 700,000 youngsters and mothers took nutritional supplements last year.

The survey, which was carried out with UNICEF’s support on the ground, also shows that one in five children was stunted in 2017, compared with more than one in four in 2012.

The growth indicator – which is used to highlight chronic or recurrent malnutrition – highlights significant differences between urban and rural areas.

In the capital Pyongyang, 10 per cent of children are affected by stunting, while in Ryanggang Province more than three times that percentage suffer, UNICEF Regional Director for East Asia and the Pacific, Karin Hulshof, told journalists in Geneva.

Youngsters in certain rural areas “urgently require much more support”, she cautioned, adding that there is “a big difference between the capital city and the countryside: an urban-rural divide”.

Among the other findings of the 2017 DPR Korea MICS Survey Findings Report are indicators showing that one in 10 children suffers from diarrhoea – a leading contributor to malnutrition and death.

In 2009, 67 per cent of children were treated with oral rehydration salts, increasing to 74 per cent last year.

The latest survey also reveals that more than one third of household drinking water is contaminated, making access to safe water and sanitation “a priority” for UNICEF in DPRK, Ms Hulshof said.

Once again, the situation is worst in rural areas, where nearly half of children are “still exposed to significant risks of illness and malnourishment”.

UNICEF and its partners are helping by installing gravity-supplied water systems to remote communities and “more houses now have access to clean water, which is good news,” Ms Hulshof said.

Other findings indicate that seven per cent of five to 11-year-olds are involved in child labour and that most households use coal or wood rather than cleaner fuel sources to heat their homes.

Defending the value of the survey and welcoming the “improved seriousness and openness” of the DPRK, the UNICEF official said that this new approach “could transform the lives” of tens of thousands of children – although much more needed to be done.