Navigating Challenges, Brazil Steps Up AIDS Response

Long heralded as a model for the global response to HIV/AIDS, Brazil is intensifying its actions, at home and abroad, in the face of potential setbacks including an arising need for new treatment regimens, the resultant increase in drug prices and the debate over intellectual property rights.

U.S.: New Yorkers Occupy Streets to Protest Budget Cuts

They have taken over a strip of the sidewalk at Park Place and Broadway, handing out flyers to passersby and taping posters to the ground and to the metal crossbars of the scaffolding that shelters them from the rain.

U.S.: Supreme Court Walmart Decision Is a “Blow to Justice”

Labour and women’s rights groups are strongly criticising the Supreme Court’s rejection of a class action suit brought by current and former female employees of Walmart who sought to represent 1.5 million female employees who claim that the company discriminated against women.

FILM-LATIN AMERICA: A Long, Tortuous Road to Justice

Fredy Peccerelli and his team of forensic anthropologists sort through human bones and other remains - shoes, clothes, ID cards. A stack of long, thick bones dark with dirt accumulates as they painstakingly reconstruct what they can from Guatemala's La Verbana Cemetery, where for decades anonymous corpses have been dumped.

SYRIA: Humanitarian Crisis Intensifies as Security Council Remains Idle

When reports of protests and subsequent civilian deaths as security forces fired on protestors began filtering in from the southern Syrian city of Dera‘a in March, many wondered what turn events would take in both Syria and the international community in the wake of earlier uprisings during the ‘Arab Spring’.

U.S.: Immigration Detainees Shuttled from Jail to Jail

Frequent and long-distance transfers to remote detention facilities are jeopardising the political and human rights of immigrants detained in the United States, according to the New York-based Human Rights Watch (HRW).

AIDS Funding Gap Threatens Treatment Targets

A staggering nine million people are still awaiting HIV treatment, yet the 22 billion dollars the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) says is needed to give them access to medicine and care has far from materialised.

Rich Nations Wage Assault on Generic AIDS Drugs

Moves by developed nations such as the United States to tighten intellectual property laws are threatening to limit production and distribution of generic drugs, which experts say have been and will remain key in the prevention and treatment of HIV/AIDS and currently account for 80 percent of HIV/AIDS treatment.

HIV Infections Down, but Treatment Access Still Uneven

Officials underscored the importance of stepped-up action Friday to combat HIV/AIDS, the worst epidemic the world has seen since it began 30 years ago, ahead of a high-level meeting on the disease at the United Nations next week.

Reports of Abuses Stain New Ivorian President’s Record

Forces loyal to Ivorian President Alassane Ouattara have carried out indiscriminate torture, rape, extrajudicial killings, and other acts of violence and abuse, according to an investigation by Human Rights Watch.

BOOKS: The Lonely Plight of the Whistleblower

"Few paths are more treacherous than the one that challenges an abuse of power," warns "A Handbook for Committing the Truth: The Corporate Whistleblower's Survival Guide" - a primer not only for whistleblowers but for corporate leaders and citizen activists as well, say authors Tom Devine and Tarek Maassarani.

U.S.: Connecticut Likely to Abolish Ultimate Punishment

This month, Connecticut became the latest in a growing line of U.S. states to move toward ending capital punishment.

Films Shrink Global Problems Down to a More Human Scale

"It's bad to be rich at the height of fame with your morals a dirty shame," says Valter pointedly as he bumps along in the back of a pickup towards Jardim Gramacho, the largest landfill in the world, located in Brazil.

ENVIRONMENT: U.N. Tries to Put Its Own House in Order

In the past few years, United Nations headquarters in New York has undergone a transformation. Besides renovating the entire building, the U.N. is trying, as a leading international organisation, to take more responsibility and set an example for environmentally-friendly, sustainable practices by implementing such changes as cutting back on printing, posting more documents online, and creating water-saving measures.

“Bold Decisions” Needed in AIDS Struggle

A new report by U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon released Thursday found progress in combating HIV/AIDS worldwide to be promising, yet inadequate to meet the needs of the 33.3 million people estimated to be living with HIV in 2009.

Syria Promises Reform as U.N. Condemns Crackdown

Protesters braved live ammunition from security forces Monday in the southern Syrian city of Dara'a, where rights groups say more than 60 people have been killed since pro-democracy activists took to the streets to demand greater freedoms from the government of President Bashar al-Assad.

U.N. Task Force Pushes for Investment in Teen Girls

Risk of sexual violence, limited access to education, and health issues such as HIV/AIDS and forced female genital mutilation/cutting are just a few of the obstacles adolescent girls face in developing countries, yet these girls are the key to the future and the eradication of poverty, stress experts at the U.N. Commission on the Status of Women (CSW).

Global Muslim Population Growing but Slowing

The world's Muslim population will increase by 35 percent in the next 20 years, according to new estimates by the Pew Research Center's Forum on Religion and Public Life.

World Bank Sees Strong Growth for Some Developing Nations

A report released Thursday by the World Bank indicates that for the next two years, developing nations are better poised on the road to economic recovery than their more developed counterparts.

HAITI: Haphazard Aid Hindering Long-Term Recovery

That Haiti will not recover from the trauma of 2010 for many years is an unfortunate but understood fact. More disturbing, according to a new analysis, is that aspects of current aid efforts are undermining Haiti's ability to begin the reconstruction process and develop a strong, functional state infrastructure.

MIDEAST: Labour Rights Slow to Catch on for Domestic Workers

Recent revelations of domestic worker abuse may be grotesque and horrifying, but they are only the most visible aspect of the many difficulties faced by these predominantly female workers, activists say.