KOLKATA, Dec 13 2013 (IPS) – Human rights have taken a step back in India, activists say after the Supreme Court overturned a ruling of the High Court that had earlier lifted the ban on gay sex.
The Delhi High Court ruling had in effect suspended application of Article 377 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC). The article, which criminalises homosexuality, was introduced in India in 1860 under British colonial rule, echoing conservative Victorian values of the age. The 19th century law indicts homosexuality as going against the law of nature by indulging in “unnatural acts”.
The Delhi High Court ruling was in response to a petition filed in 2001 by the , an NGO in Delhi, that challenged the constitutional validity of the article on the grounds that it criminalises homosexu…
Residents of Clara Town, a low-income neighbourhood of Monrovia, Liberia, face sanitation challenges with the onset of the rainy season. Credit: Travis Lupick/IPS
UNITED NATIONS, Feb 19 2014 (IPS) – When the U.N. s Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) reach their deadline in 2015, there will still be a critical setback: millions of people in the developing world without full access to safe drinking water, proper sanitation and electricity in their homes.
Conscious of this shortcoming, the 193-member General Assembly hosted a two-day high-level meeting, which concluded Wednesday, to address three thematic issues: water, sanitation and sustainable energy, spe…
This is the second in a three-part series of about women and Option B+ in Africa
A Swazi mother with her baby. In July Swaziland will roll out Option B+, the latest treatment recommended by the World Health Organisation for HIV positive mothers. Credit: Mantoe Phakathi/IPS
MBABANE, Jun 5 2014 (IPS) – For months, Nonkululeko Msibi could not find her voice each time she wanted to share the news to her husband. She had learned that she was infected with HIV at the age of 16 when delivering her firstborn baby at Swaziland s Mbabane Government Hospital.
“Although I was shocked by the news, I accepted it,” Msibi told IPS. “But the most difficult pa…
WASHINGTON, Jul 15 2014 (IPS) – Even as aid workers are warning that children in South Sudan are falling victim to mass malnutrition, international agencies are said to be missing their fundraising goals to avert a looming famine in the country.
On Monday, Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF), the international medical relief organisation, reported that nearly three-quarters of the more than 18,000 patients admitted to the agency’s feeding programmes in South Sudan have been children. South Sudan has experienced mounting civil violence in recent months, which humanitarian groups warn has directly impacted farmers’ ability to plant and grow crops.
7 Countries, 7 Stories – A Global Approach to Reproductive Health and Family Planning
The eight islands that comprise Turtle Islands, Sierra Leone, are remote and practically untouched by modern civilisation. Credit: Joan Erakit/IPS
MATTRU JONG, Sierra Leone, Aug 26 2014 (IPS) – Emmanuel is a male midwife.
At the age of 26, he lives and works on one of eight islands off the southwest peninsular of Sierra Leone, an hour by speedboat from Mattru Jong, the capital of Bonthe District.
On a particularly hot Wednesday morning, IPS joins , (UNFPA) and Sierra Leone’s Ministry of Health to go and visit a population on one of the Turtle Islands that is pr…
There are an estimated 13,000 pieces of plastic litter afloat every single square kilometer of ocean. Credit: Bo Eide Snemann/CC-BY-2.0
ATHENS, Oct 10 2014 (IPS) – Imagine a black-footed albatross feeding its chick plastic pellets, a baby seal in the North Pole helplessly struggling with an open-ended plastic bag wrapped tight around its neck, or a fishing vessel stranded mid-sea, a length of discarded nylon net entangled in its propeller. Multiply these scenarios a thousand-fold, and you get a glimpse of the state of the world’s oceans.
With an average of estimated to be afloat every single square kilometer of ocean globally, and 6.4 million tonnes …
Elderly people exercising in a city square as part of the municipal programme Healthy Stations in public parks in Buenos Aires, where health controls are also offered for people over 60. Credit: Fabiana Frayssinet/IPS
BUENOS AIRES, Dec 9 2014 (IPS) – The eternally young Latin America is also ageing, due to the rise in life expectancy and the drop in birth rates a demographic revolution that poses new challenges in a region that has begun to move slowly away from its status as the most unequal part of the world.
The report by the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), confirmed that this century there are fewer children per couple and more older adults, whi…
Farmers with the Landless Workers’ Movement (MST) protest the concentration of land ownership in Brazil, during a Feb. 21 demonstration in support of the occupation of part of the Agropecuaria Santa Mônica estate, 150 km from Brasilia. Credit: Courtesy of the MST
UNITED NATIONS, Mar 19 2015 (IPS) – The growing economic inequalities between rich and poor – and the lopsided concentration of wealth and power in the hands of the world’s one percent are undermining international efforts to fight global poverty, environmental degradation and social injustice, according to a civil society alliance.
Comprising ActionAid, Greenpeace, Oxfam and Civicus, the group of widel…
Experts have said for years that Kathmandu is an extremely high-risk city in the event of seismic activity, yet Nepal was caught off guard when a massive earthquake struck on Apr. 25, 2015. Credit: Amantha Perera/IPS
COLOMBO, May 8 2015 (IPS) – There has never been any doubt that Nepal is sitting on one of the most seismically active areas in South Asia. The fact that, when the big one struck, damages and deaths would be catastrophic has been known for years.
Indeed, when this correspondent visited Nepal several years ago, and found himself climbing up the narrow, winding stairwell of the Nepal Red Cross Society office in Kathmandu, a poster on one of the doors demanded …
An estimated 4.5 million Vietnamese people were potentially exposed to Agent Orange during the decade 1961-1972. Credit: naturalbornstupid/CC-BY-SA-2.0
WASHINGTON, Jun 29 2015 (IPS) – A key senator and a D.C.-based think tank are calling for Washington to step up its aid in cleaning up toxic herbicides sprayed by the United States in Vietnam during the war that ended 40 years ago.
Speaking last week at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a major think tank here, Vermont Senator Patrick Leahy, who has long led the efforts in the U.S. Congress to compensate Vietnamese war victims, called on Washington to do more, arguing that it will furthe…