The UN's decision to take deep-sea mining applications comes when there is no mining code in place. Several countries have insisted that industrial undersea mining should require strict rules.

Three British men are being held by the Taliban in Afghanistan, according to an NGO. A UK broadcaster reports that one of them is so-called "danger tourist" Miles Routledge.

Moscow will hold the UN Security Council's rotating presidency for the month of April. Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu has vowed to increase munitions supplies to Russian forces in Ukraine. DW has the latest.

Nearly 400 Afghan women who are UN employees have now been banned from working for the organization by the Taliban. Previously, those working with the UN were exempt from the ban.

The UN accused the Taliban of forcing it to choose between abiding by its principles and serving Afghans. The Taliban told the UN it could not employ women in the country; so the UN is considering its mission's future.

More people are trying to cross the Mediterranean to seek a better life, but many do not make it. The UN has slammed policies by some states that seek to make the crossing harder.

At least 180 people have been killed and a further 1,800 injured in three days of fighting between rival factions in Sudan, according to the United Nations special representative for Sudan, as the Group of Seven joined calls for an immediate to end to hostilities.

Martin Kobler says the blue helmets in eastern DR Congo are not doing enough to stop new attacks by the M23 militia. The retired German envoy headed the MONUSCO peacekeeping mission in the DRC between 2013 and 2015.

By the middle of the year, if not sooner, India will have the most people of any country in the world, new UN estimates show. Asian giants China and India alone account for almost 3 billion of 8 billion worldwide.

The International Organization for Migration (IOM) said an employee has died in Sudan after his vehicle was caught in crossfire. Fighting continues despite a cease-fire offer.

To mark Afghan women's day on FRANCE 24, we hear from two women wielding their art in resistance against the Taliban. Performance and visual artist Kubra Khademi lives in France because her artwork provoked death threats at home in Afghanistan. Now based in Paris, she creates artwork about being in exile.

The UN's World Meteorological Organization said saving glaciers was now effectively a lost cause. The annual report also recorded sea levels rising at an annual average of 4.62 millimeters in the past decade.