Members of a UN peacekeeping mission engaged in “transactional sex” with more than 225 Haitian women who said they needed to do so to obtain things like food and medication, a sign that sexual exploitation remains significantly underreported in such missions, according to a new report.

An accomplished former US prosecutor is taking United Nations secretary general Ban Ki-moon to a tribunal, accusing him of blocking his appointment to the world body’s top investigative post.

The United Nations investigated more than 300 members of UN peacekeeping missions for alleged sexual exploitation and abuse during the past three years and more than half were fired or sent home, a senior UN official said.

Four peacekeepers from Bangladesh have been sent home and 13 other UN personnel serving in southern Sudan are under investigation for alleged serious misconduct, including sexual exploitation and abuse, the United Nations said tonight.

UN peacekeepers in Congo sexually abused and exploited women and girls, some as young as 13, according to a report released by a UN watchdog today.