Michael Deibert
KINSHASA, Apr 24 2008 (IPS) – The rain falls in battering sheets, rolling eastward along the Congo River through Kinshasa, capital of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). It is midday, but the sky turns black and soon the potholed streets of this decrepit yet vibrant metropolis are filled with pond-sized puddles, many of them larger than the cars that traverse them.
The DRC's Congo River – one of many water sources in the Ce…
Nitin Jugran
TONK, Rajasthan, Jun 3 2008 (IPS) – Children should be seen, not heard an adage that remains in practice in most parts of rural India even today where the orthodox patriarchal traditions continue to hold sway in tightly-knit local communities.
Child reporter Suman (extreme right) discussing development issues with villagers. Credit: Nitin Jugran/IPS
It is nothing short of revolutionary then that children in some villages of Rajasthan, the largest s…
Tarjei Kidd Olsen
OSLO, Jul 2 2008 (IPS) – Environmental damage, diseases or workers rights abuses are common at fish farms in Chile and Canada operated by the world s largest salmon company, according to activists.
Fish lice-infected salmon at a Canadian salmon farm. Credit: Pure Salmon Campaign
A group of Chilean and Canadian scientists and activists visited Oslo to press home the accusations at the company s annual general meeting last month.
The Norwegian-run company, Marine Harvest, denies many of the…
Kalinga Seneviratne
MANILA, Aug 1 2008 (IPS) – A growing and heated debate in this predominantly Catholic country revolves around the church s uncompromising stance against the use of contraceptive devices that is said to be contributing to poverty and affecting the quality of life for many Filipinos.
A group of 15 bishops led some 12,000 protestors at a rally here on Jul. 25 against a proposed House of Representatives bill aimed at devising a national reproductive health policy.
Pulling the other way opinion pieces in the national press have been critical of President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo s pro-Catholic church stand on population issues. They urged her to make a bold anti-poverty statement in the State of the Nation Address (SONA) that was delivered on Monday.
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Thalif Deen
UNITED NATIONS, Sep 18 2008 (IPS) – The Global Sanitation Fund (GSF), created last March with a 100-million-dollar target per year, is being billed as a key financing mechanism aimed at meeting one of the eight U.N. Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).
Boys use new latrines at Tulung Elementary School in Pundong Village in the…
Michael J. Carter
SEATTLE, Washington, Nov 13 2008 (IPS) – Working for sustainable development in Kenya, which ranks 148th out of 177 countries on the United Nations development index, is a daunting task. The country not only has a 6.1 percent rate of HIV/AIDS infection among its 37 million people, but nearly 60 percent of Kenyans live on less than two dollars a day.
Children gather in front of the newly painted and expanded Rabuor Nursery Schoo…
Adam Morrow and Khaled Moussa al-Omrani
CAIRO, Jan 8 2009 (IPS) – Egyptian authorities have almost fully sealed the border with Gaza, preventing delivery of desperately needed humanitarian aid.
The government has expressly forbidden the entry of aid convoys laden with food into the Gaza Strip, Emmad al-Din Moustafa, member of the Popular Committee for Aiding Gaza told IPS. The continued border closure like the Israeli assault itself constitutes a crime against humanity.
Israel began a series of devastating air strikes on targets throughout the Gaza Strip Dec. 27, followed by a ground offensive launched Jan. 3. According to Israeli officials, the campaign, which has included thousands of air strikes and naval bombardment, comes in retaliation for rockets fired at Isr…
Ashfaq Yusufzai
PESHAWAR, Feb 19 2009 (IPS) – The battle to eradicate polio in Pakistan has become more complicated.
The government has pinned responsibility on the World Health Organisation (WHO) for the sudden spread of the P3 virus in northwestern Pakistan and the tribal areas bordering Afghanistan since 2008.
The WHO stopped the P3 vaccination causing a rise in cases in 2008, says Dr Mohammad Ali Chauhan, who is in charge of the polio eradication campaign in the North West Frontier Province (NWFP). Thirty three of the 52 cases of polio (in the province and Federally Administered Tribal Areas FATA) were of the P3 virus last year.
Since January, four new cases have been reported from Charsadda and other parts of the NWFP. Last week, a special campaign agai…
Esther Tola
COTONOU, Mar 28 2009 (IPS) – Judges and gynaecologists in Benin have undergone training on the interpretation of forensic evidence in cases of violence against women, as well as in investigative procedures when dealing with rape cases.
The training took place in Cotonou, the country s economic capital, at an international conference held Mar. 16 to 19 as part of the Women s Justice and Empowerment Initiative, a U.S. government-funded programme to strengthen awareness of gender-based violence and prosecution of perpetrators in four African countries.
In Benin, this initiative is being carried out by Care International and its Empower project, working to enhance the ability of local and national bodies to address the needs of women affected by violence.
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Pilirani Semu-Banda
LILONGWE, Apr 29 2009 (IPS) – An influential women rights organisation in Malawi, Women in Law in Southern Africa-Malawi (WILSA-Malawi), is suing the government of Malawi for preventing women from accessing safe abortion.
Malawian law prohibits abortion Section 149 of the country s penal code says any person who administers abortion shall be liable to imprisonment for 14 years, while Section 150 indicates that any woman who solicits abortion is liable to seven years imprisonment.
But WILSA-Malawi s executive director, Seodi White, calls the existing laws nonsensical because they infringe on women s rights. She says they force women to seek back-street abortions from traditional healers and illegal clinics thereby putting their lives in danger.
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