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Thursday, September 10, 2026
News and Views from the Global South
ENVIRONMENT-LATAM: Ethical Development to Cool Off the Planet
Brazilian Environment Minister Marina Silva suggested an ethically and politically sustainable development model at a conference in this southeastern Brazilian city that has brought together national and international authorities and experts, business leaders and researchers to discuss solutions to fight climate change in the region.SOUTH AMERICA: Call Against Poverty Takes Aim at Inequality
More than two years after the launch of the Global Call to Action Against Poverty (GCAP), social movements in South America are putting the accent on the fight against social inequality and criticism of the neoliberal economic model, which they see as hindering development.FILM-BRAZIL: Elite Unit – Heroes or Anti-Heroes?
The recently released film "Tropa de Elite" (Elite Squad) has sparked unprecedented debate in Brazil about the role and actions of the security forces as they combat drug trafficking mafias in shantytowns.POLITICS-BRAZIL: No More Party-Hopping
A Brazilian Supreme Court decision that legislators cannot switch parties during their term in office - a common practice in Brazil - will pave the way for a newfound political stability, as well as a reduction in the number of parties, say analysts.
DEATH PENALTY-LATIN AMERICA: Broad Support for UN Moratorium
Many Latin American governments have not yet adopted a position, or have not communicated one, but the majority trend in the region appears to be to support the resolution for a moratorium on the death penalty proposed by a number of countries to the United Nations General Assembly.ENVIRONMENT-BRAZIL: Earth Summit Score Card, 15 Years On
Fifteen years after the 1992 Earth Summit, Brazil is again playing host to representatives from around the world who are assessing the results of the actions that arose from that landmark conference.BRAZIL: Sports, Not Overprotection, for the Disabled
Sports competitions for the disabled help parents and educators overcome the pitfalls of overprotection. Ten-year-old Andrea began swimming as a toddler, and trains twice a month in the ocean. Her mother says she has never been given special treatment, even though she has been blind from birth.BRAZIL: Plebiscite Against Privatisation of Mining Giant
Ten years after the much-criticised privatisation of the Companhia Vale do Rio Doce (CVRD), Brazil’s largest mining company, some 200 civil society organisations are attempting to undo the process, which is also facing a number of court challenges.RIGHTS-BRAZIL: ‘Quilombos’ Fight Exclusion
More than a century after the abolition of slavery, Brazil still has small remnant "quilombos", free settlements created by fugitive African slaves in the 17th and 18th centuries.
Brazil's 'Quilombos' Resist Exclusion
The historic melting-pots of Afro-Brazilian culture, "quilombos" persist, but they are marked by neglect.BRAZIL: New Security Plan Combines Prevention and Punishment
After deploying the federal police in Brazil’s most violent cities, the government of Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva is now implementing integrated social policies as the preventive arm of its new public security programme.BRAZIL: Controversial Bill to Sterilise Younger Women
A draft law to reduce the minimum age for women to undergo voluntary sterilisation in Brazil’s public hospitals from 25 to 18 is vigorously opposed by the government.
BRAZIL: Discovering Bus Travel
Brazil’s air crisis is changing the look of the crowds in bus stations in large cities like Rio de Janeiro and Sao Paulo. Many well-heeled Brazilians are opting, for the first time, to travel by bus in order to avoid the mounting delays in airports and, in some cases, a new fear of flying.SECURITY-BRAZIL: Oedipus Caught in the Crossfire
A child mown down by a hail of bullets from a rifle aimed by an unseen gunman is one of the drawings kept on file by psychologist Ricardo Parente, and produced in evidence to support his claim that Freudian theory must be revised when treating cases in the violent shantytowns of Brazil.
SOUTH AMERICA: AIDS Meds for All, But at Higher Prices
In under a decade, programmes providing universal free access to antiretroviral medicines have greatly decreased AIDS mortality in countries like Argentina and Brazil, but this progress is now threatened by the rising prices of new formulas patented by the big pharmaceutical companies.BRAZIL: Floating House Made of Garbage – Art or Eyesore?
In a fetid canal filled with garbage from this Brazilian city, a bricklayer built a floating house and turned it into a symbol of recycling, leaving the authorities by turns applauding or frowning.
Floating House Made of Garbage – Art or Eyesore?
The Rio de Janeiro authorities have wavered on whether to ban a floating house made of garbage pulled from Guanabara Bay or to declare it a museum.AGRICULTURE-BRAZIL: David, Goliath and Land Reform
The largest movement fighting for the distribution of unproductive rural property to landless peasant farmers in Brazil complains that the "euphoria" over the production of biofuels from sugar cane and other crops is aggravating the concentration of land ownership and driving up land prices.G8-BRAZIL: Guest Brings Biofuel Arguments to Summit
As a guest at the G8 summit this week in Germany, Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva will present arguments to convince the leaders of the world's eight richest countries of the importance of biofuels in the fight against global warming.BRAZIL: Indigenous Resistance Movement Defends Traditional Beliefs
Twenty indigenous people have been occupying the abandoned building of the Museu do Indio in Rio de Janeiro since October, to call attention to "500 years of resistance to genocide," a view of their history that has acquired new relevance in the light of the Vatican's latest position on Christian evangelisation during the colonial era.BRAZIL: Dorothy Stang Sentence – More Than Symbolic?
Forty percent of the 1,237 murders linked to land disputes in Brazil between 1985 and 2001 took place in the northern state of Pará. But things could begin to change there if the sentence handed down to the rancher who ordered the killing of U.S.-born nun Dorothy Stang does not end up as merely symbolic, said French priest Henri Burin des Roziers.« Previous Page — Next Page »
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