The UN reports that the number of displaced people the world reached a record high of nearly 60 million people in 2014.

UNHCR said that there was an increase in 8.3 million from the previous year. The ongoing war in Syria is seen as a major contributor. The authors of the report say their findings mean that one in every 122 people on the planet was either a refugee, internally displaced or seeking asylum.

The report states that more than 15 conflicts have begun or recommenced, including three in the Middle East and eight in Africa.

38.2 million of the total 59.5 million have been internally displaced in their own countries. 19.5 million of the total figure were refugees, half of these being children.

Eight Bosnian Croats were arrested by police in Bosnia-Herzegovina on suspicion of having committed war crimes during the conflict in Bosnia in the early 90s, AP reported.

A statement from the prosecution office in Sarajevo said on Thursday the men were members of the Bosnian Croat armed forces and that they are suspected of having arrested and tortured some 200 Bosniak civilians, including women and minors.

The African Union Summit of Heads of State and Government,  called on the United Nations General Assembly to finalise a date for holding a referendum for self-determination of the Saharawi people in Western Sahara.

The Belgian Prime Minister Charles Michel outlined his government’s recognition of the mass killings of Armenians by the Ottoman Empire as genocide this week.

Mr Michel said the killings “must be viewed as a genocide”, telling parliament “the relationship between history and the future are occasionally complicated”.

Myanmar’s long standing repressive policy toward the Rohingya Muslims was made clear in recent weeks said Human Rights Watch in a damning statement released on Tuesday.

 Senior Asia researcher for HRW, David Scott Mathieson, citing tragic events saw that thousands of Rohingya refugees flee Myanmar on boats, said,

The former Prime Minister of Kosovo, Minister Ramush Haradinaj has been detained in Slovenia, because of an investigation looking into war crimes, during the Balkan conflict in the 1990s.

He was blocked from boarding a flight at Ljubljana Airport, his party reported.

Mr Haradinaj, who was previously been acquitted over war crimes charges from a UN Court, denies allegations that he guided campaigns of murder and torture against Serbs and their allies.

The President of the Asian Development Bank (ADB) Takehiko Nakao committed to increase lending to India over upcoming years on Tuesday.

Speaking after a meeting with India’s Finance minister and Minister of Urban Development, Mr Nakao, said,

Members of the European Union have agreed to extend economic sanctions on Russia by 6 months, due to its actions in the conflict in Ukraine.

The sanctions, imposed in July 2014, will expire at the end of July this year, and are targeted at Russia's energy, defence and financial sectors.

Ambassadors from the 28 EU states also voted unanimously to extend a ban on investment in Crimea by one year. The peninsula was annexed by Russia in March 2014.

UN has urged he ban of countries from peacekeeping duties, if their troops sexually abused children where they were deployed, after a recent scandal involving French troops.

An internal review, commissioned before the latest scandal broke, recommended that the home countries of peacekeepers are identified annually and a six-month deadline for investigations are imposed on the countries.

It also recommended that countries be obliged to disclose disciplinary action taken against soldiers, as well as governments' failure to report.

At the moment, peacekeepers can only be prosecuted by their own state.

The review panel's chairman, former president of East Timor, Jose Ramos-Horta stressed "immunity should not mean impunity".

Sri Lankan troops were expelled from Haiti for sexually abusing children in 2007, with 111 soldiers and 3 officers were repatriated back to Sri Lanka after being part of UN mission in Haiti and were accused of a string of sexual assaults, including rape of children as young as 7 years old. No prosecutions or punishments have taken place.

French authorities have arrested a Rwandan priest on suspicion of committing crimes against humanity during the 1994 Rwandan genocide.

The 61 year old man was arrested in Trappes, northern France, executing an international arrest warrant issued by Rwanda’s prosecutor.

It is claimed the individual, an ethnic Hutu, was involved in the killing of up to 1,000 university students after pointing them out to men armed with machetes. He is also accused of personally interrogating and tracking down ethnic Tutsis.