BALADI NEWS
The United Nations General Assembly has adopted a $3.07bn operating budget for 2020, which for the first time also includes funding for an investigation into war crimes in Syria.
In a statement released late on Friday, the UN said that the budget would fund the investigation of crimes committed in Syria since the outbreak of the civil war in 2011, alleged war crimes in Myanmar since a crackdown on the Rohingya Muslim minority began in 2017, an observer mission in Yemen, and a political mission in Haiti.
It added that the Syria and Myanmar investigations - which were previously financed by voluntary contributions - would receive compulsory contributions from 193 member states.
The UN said that the 2020 operating budget represented a slight increase from 2019's figure of $2.9bn
The UN's operating budget is separate from the annual budget for peacekeeping operations of some $6bn that is adopted in June.
The war in Syria, now approaching its ninth year, has devastated much of the country. An estimated half a million people have been killed and millions have been forced to live as refugees.