TRADE: African Producers Press Rich Nations on Cotton Subsidies

Representatives from four major cotton-producing African countries came to Washington this week to engage in a dialogue about what they consider to be unfair U.S. trade practices.

MIDEAST: Defiant Netanyahu Plays his Jerusalem Card

Israel's newly installed ambassador in Washington says the "disagreement" with the U.S. over Israel's settlement policy will be resolved "soon". Speaking on Israel Radio, Michael Oren was giving his first interview since taking up his post.

RIGHTS-US: Byzantine World of Immigration Detention

Duarnis Perez, a native of the Dominican Republic, became a U.S. citizen at 15 when his mother was naturalised. But he didn't know that meant he was also a citizen. He thought he was an illegal immigrant, and so did the authorities.

LESOTHO-WATER: One Dollar Per Square Metre, Now Move

The construction of a two billion dollar dam in Metolong, some 35 kilometres outside of Lesotho’s capital Maseru, is being welcomed by people in and around the city who will gain access to clean and safe drinking water when construction is completed in 2013.

ECONOMY: Poll Supports Govt Intervention in Crisis

A new poll finds that the populations of a majority of nations surveyed feel that their governments are not doing enough to address the global economic crisis. However, respondents are split over whether their governments should use protectionist measures to bring about recovery.

CLIMATE CHANGE-CHINA: Reluctance to Curb Emissions

China has welcomed Obama administration’s efforts to lead a global movement to curb greenhouse gas emissions, but it has spawned concerns in Beijing that international pressure to cap emissions could mount, thus slowing the pace of economic growth.

HAITI: Women "More Protected" to Report Sexual Violence

It has been five years since the U.N. sent peacekeepers to Haiti following the forced departure of President Jean-Bertrand Aristide, and the country, while not in a state of war, remains one of the world's most unstable.

IRAN: More Cracks in Political and Clerical Elites

Five weeks after the disputed presidential elections, and four days after former president Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani delivered a controversial speech at the Friday Prayers in Tehran in which he sided with the opposition and challenged the legitimacy of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's government, the rift between the ruling elites has widened, with some in the conservative camp taking a critical stance against the ostensibly re-elected president.

DR-CONGO: Firms Fuelling 'Conflict Minerals' Violence, Report Says

Several international companies are named as helping to prolong the more than 12-year conflict in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) in a new report by the British-based group Global Witness, released Tuesday.

HAITI: "We Have Never Had Justice"

Amazil Jean-Baptiste remembers when they came to kill her son.

SUDAN: Ruling on Oil-Rich Border Area Fraught With Tension

The international community, in particular the U.S., has a responsibility to ensure that this week's upcoming legal decision on the boundary of Abyei, an oil-rich and contested region along the disputed north-south border within Sudan, is respected and that the residents of Abyei and the affected surrounding areas are protected from violence, said a strategy paper by the Enough Project released Monday.

UGANDA: Rights Group Protests Indefinite Detentions

A prominent human rights group is demanding the release or trials of five Ugandan detainees held by military intelligence for up to 16 months.

MIDEAST: ‘Let Obama Talk…’

A joke deriding U.S. President Barack Obama is said to be making the rounds in Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's bureau, according to Aluf Benn, the normally well-informed Ha'aretz diplomatic correspondent: "What do Americans do when anything breaks down in their home - when the sink is blocked, the toilet overflows, or a fuse snaps? Simple: They ask Barack Obama to give a speech and the problem is solved."

HEALTH-AFRICA: Maintain Funding for HIV/AIDS Prevention

Health experts and scientists have accused the world's wealthiest countries of abandoning the goal of universal access to HIV prevention, care and treatment by 2010.

Ecobreves – MEXICO: A Factory of Green Ideas

Mexico's University of the Environment (UMA) will begin in September a program in environmental law and public policy.

Ecobreves – HONDURAS: A Law to Fight Natural Disasters

The Honduran parliament last week passed its first law to prevent and mitigate risks related to natural disasters and to establish greater institutional coordination for confronting such events.

Ecobreves – ARGENTINA: Restrictions on Sábalo Fishing

Given the national government's delay in setting a quota for exports of the sábalo fish (Prochilodus lineatus), an overexploited river species, the eastern province of Santa Fe established the maximum for catches until year end.

Ecobreves – BRAZIL: Agrarian Reform to Pay for Reforestation

Farmers who received land in an Amazonian distribution will receive about 50 dollars a month to reforest their plots, announced the government's national settlement and agrarian reform agency, INCRA.

IRAN: Opposition Shows Life Around Friday Prayer

Amid a flurry of anticipation and speculation, former Iranian president Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani led Friday prayers in Tehran this week.

RIGHTS-UGANDA: Women Press for Domestic Violence Bill

"Man forces wife to breastfeed puppies," screams one headline. "Police boss shoots wife," shouts another; and a third: "Man batters wife over meat". These are typical headlines in Uganda’s newspapers today. Women daily report surviving different forms of violence in their homes: physical, sexual, emotional or even economic abuse.

US-IRAN: To Deal or Not to Deal, That Is the Question

In 2007, after eight months of detention in Iran – four in solitary confinement in Tehran's notorious Evin prison – Iranian-American scholar Haleh Esfandiari returned to the U.S. and held a press conference at the Woodrow Wilson International Centre for Scholars, where she directs the Middle East Programme.