Subsistence farmers in Ghana are learning how to hold back the decline in the fertility of the smallholdings they cultivate while revitalizing their soils as desertification increasingly threatens their land and livelihoods.

The Special Representative of the Secretary-General and Head of the United Nations Office for West Africa and the Sahel (UNOWAS), Mohamed Ibn Chambas, condemns the killing by unknown gunmen of a Ghanaian journalist, Ahmed Hussein-Suale, on 16 December in Madina, suburb of Accra, capital of Ghana.

United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has congratulated the people of Ghana for exercising their democratic rights and peacefully conducting the presidential and parliamentary elections on 7 December.

The head of the United Nations Mission for Ebola Emergency Response (UNMEER) today joined an advance team deployed in Accra, Ghana, to ensure the rapid, effective and coherent action necessary to stop the outbreak, treat the infected, ensure essential services, preserve stability and prevent the spread of the deadly virus.

We cannot afford to let fear keep us away, the President of Ghana today told the United Nations General Assembly calling for a sustained, coordinated international effort to stem the outbreak of the Ebola virus which he calls a "disease of isolation."

Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has officially established the United Nations Mission for Ebola Emergency Response and has instructed the advance teams for the first-of-its-kind operation to head to its base in Accra, Ghana, by Monday, 22 September.

Urging health authorities in West African countries affected by the largest Ebola outbreak in history to "leave no stone unturned" in their efforts to contain the spread of the deadly virus, a United Nations World Health Organization (WHO) official today underscored the critical need to engage community, religious and opinion leaders in the region to be at the forefront of the response.

Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has appointed Major General Delali Johnson Sakyi of Ghana as the head of the United Nations mission tasked with monitoring the ceasefire line between India and Pakistan.