Simon Baron-Cohen, Director of the Autism Research Center at the University of Cambridge, gives the keynote address during a special event held to mark World Autism Awareness Day. Credit: UN Photo/Eskinder Debebe
UNITED NATIONS, Apr 2 2017 (IPS) – Guardianship laws meant to protect people with autism actually deprive them of their basic rights and autonomy, according to experts on a UN panel.
When people with autism turn 18, their parents or other caregivers are encouraged to legally become their guardians. However, as Zoe Gross an autism self-advocate says the practice deprives people with autism of the ability to influence their own lives.
Gross was on…
Joseph Chamie is an independent consulting demographer and a former director of the United Nations Population Division.
The international community of nations has made commitments to eliminate hunger, achieve food security and improved nutrition by 2030 and also to promote and protect health through nutritious diet, healthy eating and increased physical activity. Credit: IPS
NEW YORK, Jun 12 2017 (IPS) – Global …
Shahndah Rani. Credit: Shahiduzzaman
Banaripara (Barisal), Sep 4 2017 (IPS) – She was born in the early 1950’s to an ultra-poor family in Kundihar, a remote village of Banaripara of Barisal division in Bangladesh. She was a beautiful baby and her father named her ‘Shahndah Rani’ which means ‘Queen of Evenings’. But in reality her life was far from that of a queen.
Born into acute poverty, there were days when she went without any food. Rani s parents could not afford any schooling and gave her away in marriage at age 16 to relieve some of the pressures on them. She was married off to Monoranjan Dhar, who despite being poor himself, cared for Rani.
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Women village councilors in Penakota, a village in southeast India, go out into a field to relieve themselves, as there are no toilets in their workplace. Credit: Stella Paul/IPS
UNITED NATIONS, Nov 27 2017 (IPS) – What would life be like without access to a toilet? What if our waste was not properly disposed of?
For those in the developed world, such questions are hard to fathom, but for 2.3 billion people around the world it’s a reality. Without access to a toilet many are forced to defecate in the open, significantly increasing the changes of spreading diseases.
The sixth Sustainable Development Goal (SDG’…
This article is part of a series of stories and op-eds launched by IPS on the occasion of this year’s International Women’s Day on March 8.
Displaced women at the Simba Mosala Site in Kikwit, Democratic Republic of Congo.
Credit: Badylon Kawanda Bakiman/IPS
KIKWIT, DR Congo, Mar 4 2018 (IPS) – The numbers are hard to fathom. Nearly two million people driven from their homes in 2017 alone. The worst cholera epidemic of the past 15 years, with over 55,000 cases and more than 1,000 deaths. Countless others killed, maimed or sexually assaulted.
Plastic bags and bottles comprise a major part of the rubbish that clogs this delicate mountain ecosystem when scores of Hindu devotees flock to the Amarnath cave in Kashmir to worship a representation of the god Shiva. Credit: Athar Parvaiz/IPS
ROME, May 31 2018 (IPS) – On June 5th, World Environment Day will be hosted in India under the banner of “Beat Plastic Pollution,” aiming to raise awareness and civic engagement alongside c…
This article is part of a series of stories on disability inclusion.
Participants of the first Disability Pride Parade in New York City in 2015. New York has a long way to go before their infrastructure becomes inclusive for people with disabilities. Courtesy: UN Photo
UNITED NATIONS, Aug 22 2018 (IPS) – Even though over six billion people—nearly one billion of whom will have disabilities— are expected to live in urban centres by 2050, many of the world’s major urban cities have a long way to go before their infrastructure becomes inclusive for people with disabilities.
As the world’s population ages, in 2050, more than 20 percent will b…
scatterlings and orphanages.
He looks around, around.
STOCKHOLM / ROME, Jan 21 2019 (IPS) – I thought about this song by Paul Simon while I in 2011 spent a few weeks in Kinshasa. I was a foreign man in a strange world, surrounded by sights and sounds, completely dependent on my new-found Congolese friends. When our taxi got stuck in a traffic jam and we had to walk to our destination I was stopped by a group of heavily armed youngsters, lead by a man who claimed to be a policeman, charging me with an exaggerated high fine for taking photos within a restricted area.
Zaída Catalán and Michael Sharp. Credit: TT News Agency/AFP/Getty Images and Human Rights Watch
From my …
A group of farmers attend a field day on diversification for improved productivity and nutrition. Experts have recognised the agricultural sector’s special role in mitigating child and maternal under-nutrition in vulnerable groups through the increased availability of diversified diets. Credit: Friday Phiri/IPS
PEMBA, Zambia, Apr 26 2019 (IPS) – It is slightly after 3pm on a hot Wednesday afternoon in Chipata district, eastern Zambia, and a group of women are gathering for a meeting. It is Elizabeth Tembo’s turn to stand amongst the other mothers like herself and share key lessons on…
Hiroshima, Japan. Photo: Internet Archives 1945
NAIROBI, Kenya, Sep 11 2019 (IPS) – From the ashes of a tragedy that wiped out almost 90% of the city of Hiroshima on 6 August 1945, an institute called the (HPC) rose like a phoenix of hope that is pioneering the creation of a global pool of peacebuilders. It is driven by the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development declaration that there can be no sustainable development without peace and no peace without sustainable development.”
Hiroshima underwent miraculous post-war reconstruction after World War II, and it epitomizes speed, innovation, technology and efficiency which marks the Japanese character of utter disc…