RIGHTS-US: Group Charges Complicity by CIA Medics in Torture

Did physicians and psychologists help the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency develop a new research protocol to assess and refine the use of waterboarding or other harsh interrogation techniques?

EAST TIMOR: ‘No Resolution in Sight on Issue of Justice’

Ten years since its people voted 78.5 percent in favour of independence, how has East Timor fared?

SOUTH AFRICA: Law Failing Lesbians on “Corrective Rape”

"Women are getting killed in the Western Cape," says Ndumie Funda, who runs LulekiSizwe in her "cabin" in the township of Gugulethu near Cape Town.

RIGHTS: U.S. Forum Highlights Abuses in Post-Election Iran

The Emory University School of Law and a coalition of Iranian students co-hosted a daylong seminar Saturday to discuss the controversial Jun. 12 Iranian presidential election and the human rights abuses perpetrated in its wake.

MIDEAST: Olmert’s Peace Plan May Go Down With Him

The State of Israel against the former leader of the State of Israel - for the first time, a former prime minister will soon be in the defendant's chair in a criminal court.

Ecobreves – MEXICO: War Against Plastic Bags Expands to All Trash

The ban on shops providing non-biodegradable plastic bags for their clients' purchases is in force in the Mexican capital, but is not enough to get solid waste management under control, say environmentalists.

Ecobreves – CHILE: Government Lists High Andes Wetlands

The Chilean Agriculture Ministry's center for natural resources information is putting together the first information system on High Andes wetlands in the three regions of the country's north.

Ecobreves – ARGENTINA: Sounding the Alarm for Shrinking Glaciers

The Argentine chapter of the environmental group Greenpeace called on governments to fight global warming, which is melting South America's glaciers.

MOZAMBIQUE: Markets Too Far For Farmers’ Profit

August is peak tomato season in the Niassa province of northwest Mozambique, and farmers are bringing bucket-loads of tomatoes to sell to Nkwichi Lodge, one of the few buyers of local produce in the region.

AFRICA: Climate Change ‘is a Security Issue’

Africa is the canary in the mine of global security, as climate change threatens to redraw the maps of the continent and the world.

RIGHTS-US: New York “Terror” Detainee in Draconian Conditions

As the planned closing of the U.S. military's detention centre at Guantanamo Bay draws nearer, human rights activists are raising questions about the treatment of detainees who will be transferred to the U.S. for trial.

RIGHTS-CAMBODIA: Newest Evacuation ‘Biggest in Decades’

Dozens of families this week started dismantling their homes and moving away from lakeside land in the centre of the capital after giving up on their lengthy struggle to remain. By the end of the eviction process at this site, around 30,000 people will have been moved off now-valuable land.

EAST TIMOR: Solidarity Activists Press for Justice

After three years behind bars as a political prisoner in Indonesia, British human rights campaigner Carmel Budiardjo saw firsthand the viciousness of former President Suharto’s military dictatorship. Expelled from the country in 1971, Budiardjo knew there would be suffering when the Indonesian military invaded East Timor in 1975.

ZIMBABWE: Women’s Rights Activists Lobby to ‘Engender’ Constitution

Zimbabwe’s latest constitutional reform process has generated strong interest among activists in strengthening protection for women's rights. The early signs are that the drafting of a new constitution will not prioritise correcting legal, social and economic discrimination against women.

MIDEAST: Obama Steers the Peace Train On

It isn't formal yet, but it's bound to be soon - within the coming six weeks, Palestinians and Israelis will again be sitting down around the peace table.

POLITICS-CAMBODIA: Khmer Rouge Tribunal Keeps the Country Informed

The ongoing Khmer Rouge tribunal here of Kaing Guek Eav, known as Comrade Duch, has heard some highly charged testimony in recent weeks, as civil parties have told the court of how the murders of their loved ones ruined their lives.

NEPAL: Women Use Porous Border Route With India to Gulf

On Jul. 11, 15 women between the ages of 22 and 28 landed by a Gulf Airlines flight at Nepal's Tribhuvan International Airport.

WOMEN-MALAYSIA: Top of the Class, Nowhere in Politics

Yet another by-election is over in Malaysia.

RIGHTS-US: CIA Probe Should Go Farther, Groups Say

Attorney General Eric Holder's decision Monday to investigate whether interrogators from the Central Intelligence Agency or its contractors violated any federal laws in applying "enhanced interrogation techniques" to detainees in U.S. custody overseas triggered immediate criticism from human rights advocates and appeared to widen the partisan divide between Republicans and Democrats.

MIDEAST: Non-Story Sets Off Ripples of Trouble

It's not so much the proverbial making-a-mountain-out-of-a-molehill, but Israel finds itself climbing out of a stinky dung heap and onto a slippery diplomatic minefield.

Slide Show: Traditional Medicine in São Tomé

If you live in São Tomé, a good investment in your health is to plant a po-sabom tree (Dracaena aroborea) in your backyard.