<p>WASHINGTON, D.C.—The world’s largest conference on women’s health and empowerment in more than a decade opened today, with a call to increase funding commitments for maternal, reproductive, and newborn health by $12 billion each year.</p>

<p>WASHINGTON, D.C.—Global health leaders at Women Deliver, the world’s largest maternal health conference, have called on the G-8 and G-20 to dramatically increase investments in midwifery services in developing countries.</p>

<p>COPENHAGEN — H.R.H. Crown Princess Mary of Denmark has become Patron of UNFPA, the United Nations Population Fund, to support the agency’s work to promote maternal health and safer motherhood in more than 150 developing nations.</p>

<p>KINSHASA—President Joseph Kabila of the Democratic Republic of the Congo has pledged to promote the emergence an AIDS-Free Generation, to ensure safer motherhood and to eliminate mother-child-transmission of HIV in his country.</p>

<p>UNITED NATIONS — With only five years left until the 2015 deadline to achieve the Millennium Development Goals, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon is announcing the development of a Joint Action Plan for accelerating progress on maternal and newborn health.</p> <p> </p>

<p>UNITED NATIONS — The global financial crisis should not be allowed to prevent further investments in health and human well-being, said Thoraya Ahmed Obaid, Executive Director of UNFPA.  The lack of such social investment, she warned, will be most acutely felt in the poorest countries, and will most severely impact those who are socially and economically the most underprivileged—particularly poor women and girls.</p>

<p>UNITED NATIONS — A new vision of urban planning that will positively transform the way cities grow across the developing world in the 21st Century was presented in a study issued today.</p>

<p>UNITED NATIONS, New York — Bill and Melinda Gates and the Asian Forum of Parliamentarians on Population and Development have won this year’s United Nations Population Award. Announced here today, the Award is given annually to individuals and institutions for outstanding work in population and in improving the health of individuals.</p>

<p>COLOMBO, Sri Lanka  — Getting proper health care is a challenge for thousands of Sri Lankans who have recently gone home to former conflict zones. UNFPA, the United Nations Population Fund, is stepping up its support for the health and safety of women and girls who are returning, particularly those who are pregnant.</p>

<p>ULAANBAATAR, Mongolia — Mongolia’s extreme winter conditions are preventing expectant mothers from reaching health facilities, putting their lives at risk. In response, UNFPA is supporting mobile medical teams that have brought life-saving care to women in isolated districts in 12 provinces.</p>

<p>UNITED NATIONS — Estimates that there could be as many as 63,000 pregnant women among the 3 million people affected by Haiti’s earthquake have led to an urgent appeal to meet their emergency maternal health needs.</p>

<p>UNITED NATIONS — UNFPA is working as part of the coordinated United Nations response and with other partners to provide urgent humanitarian assistance to those who have been affected by the devastating earthquake in Haiti.</p>