MIDEAST: Gaza Reemerging From the Ashes

The United Nations is urgently appealing for 613 million dollars to aid more than a million desperate civilians in the ruins of Gaza, where schools, hospitals, houses, factories and even farmland were obliterated during the three-week assault by Israeli air and ground forces.

EDUCATION-ZAMBIA: Communities Doing it For Themselves

"My mother has no job and she cannot afford the cost of educating me and my sister at the government school," says 12-year-old Muyunda Nyamba. But the little boy is one of 37,000 children from Zambia's poorest neighbourhoods beginning the new school year calendar at community-run schools.

RIGHTS-US: Study Challenges Claims of Gitmo Recidivism

A prominent law professor says the U.S. Defence Department is issuing questionable data on the number of Guantanamo detainees who have been released "and then returned to the battlefield" because the government "is now in a position where they have to find some bad guys - even if they have to invent them by naming people who were never there".

/UPDATE/MIGRATION-US: Building a House for Day Labourers

Twenty-five centuries ago, ancient Athenians set aside part of their agora, the central public plaza, as a place where people seeking temporary work and others seeking workers could meet.

RIGHTS-PHILIPPINES: Poor Suffer Most From Corruption

Apo Aguila, a computer programmer, moved to Singapore in 2005, frustrated with the news that Philippine President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo had allegedly cheated in the 2004 presidential election.

RIGHTS-NEPAL: Law on Disappearances Provokes Outcry

Despite loud opposition, the Maoist-led coalition government of Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal has vowed to push through an ordinance to resolve the cases of hundreds of people ‘disappeared’ during the decade-long people's war waged between Maoist rebels and the forces of the former monarchy.

US-IRAN: Nobel Laureate Calls for Direct Diplomacy

Almost exactly 30 years ago the U.S.-backed dictator, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, the Shah of Iran, fled his country, never to return. Shortly after his departure and the subsequent collapse of the monarchy, the Islamic Republic of Iran was born.

POLITICS-MADAGASCAR: Scores Dead in Political Violence

"The capital has never known such stillness," Marie Ratonvonirina said of the one-day stayaway declared by the mayor of Antannanarivo, Andry Rajoelina, on Jan. 29.

COTE D’IVOIRE: Formal Economy Returns to the North

Mamadou Dembélé has removed all the contraband products he has sold for the past in six years at his shop in Bouaké in central Ivory Coast. This is due to the gradual return of government control in the area - occupied by the rebellion launched in the country in September 2002.

FINANCE: From Have Less to Have None?

Despite two decades of phenomenal world economic growth, income inequalities between the richest and poorest have steadily increased - a trend likely to be accentuated as economies across the globe begin to contract, experts say.

JAPAN: NHK World TV – New Kid on Broadcast Block

Determined to tell its own story to the world Japan on Monday launched its own 24-hour English-language TV news channel - NHK World TV.

MIDEAST: So What Was the Assault All About

Just over a week before they go to the polls, Israelis are in a grim mood. The gloom is fed by the leading candidates, all of whom are seeking to outdo one another in sombre assessment of the challenges that lie ahead.

Ecobreves – HONDURAS: Indians Join Organic Coffee Projects

Cultivation of organic coffee will be promoted in the Honduran municipality of La Campa, in the western department of Lempira, home to a mostly indigenous population that seeks to sell the product to Europe.

Ecobreves – ARGENTINA: Phone the President, Demand Forest Law

The Argentine chapter of Greenpeace is urging the public to telephone President Cristina Fernández to ask for her speedy enactment of the native forests law that was passed 14 months ago.

Ecobreves – BRAZIL: Government Aims to End Sugarcane Burnoffs

Brazil's Environment Ministry this month will launch the Agro-Ecological Zoning of Sugarcane and a new law to reduce the burnoffs applied before plantings, with the goal of ending them in 2020.

Ecobreves – MEXICO: Nanotechnology to Unblock Oil Pipelines

Mexican scientists are turning to nanotechnology for an economical and effective solution for unblocking oil pipelines -- a problem that otherwise costs companies great sums of money worldwide.

ECONOMY: China Warns Against Protectionism

China is worried that the lingering financial crisis could unleash a spiral of protectionist policies across the globe, which could further dent its trade-dependent economy.

INDIA: Meltdown Hits Textile Industry

While the Indian economy has been relatively insulated from the international financial crisis, one particular sector that has been badly hit by the ongoing worldwide recession is the textiles and garments manufacturing industry.

ECONOMY-JAPAN: Meltdown Prompts ODA Boost To Asia

Japanese Prime Minister Taro Aso told the World Economic Forum (WEF) at the Swiss mountain resort of Davos on Saturday that Japan will provide 17 billion US dollars worth of aid to stimulate Asia’s economies.

MEDIA-US: Gaza Coverage Echoed Govt Support of Israel

U.S. television coverage of the recent three-week conflict in the Gaza Strip failed to tell both sides of the story, according to a number of media analysts.

INDIA: WSF Must Address Terrorism Says Mumbai

Civil society in this port city, victim of the Nov. 26-29 terrorist attacks and host to the 2004 World Social Forum, has one question to ask - will the movement seriously address terrorism?