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Monday, August 24, 2026
News and Views from the Global South
PAKISTAN: Floods Bring Out Another Crisis – Maternal Risks
The floods that have submerged one-fifth of Pakistan have begun to recede, but the crisis has brought to light one of the country’s hidden miseries: the plight of mothers, who are dying in tens of thousands each year.
SOUTH ASIA: Fishers’ Release A Good Catch for India-Pakistan Ties
It took almost two hours before Jeenti Deva, 16, could board the bus that would bring him home to India, but the long wait did not stop him from smiling.
RIGHTS-PAKISTAN: Mob Brutality Raises Painful Questions
A breakdown in Pakistan’s justice system, a sign of a society desensitised to violence, an example of mob brutality.
DEVELOPMENT-PAKISTAN: Flood Aid Exposes Distrust of Gov’t
Inundated by appeals through text messages, email and Twitter, as well as in print and broadcast media, that call for donations of dried rations, hygiene kits, buckets, tubs and cooking pots, and straw mats, Ambreen Siddiqui feels lost in trying to help her fellow Pakistanis amid the country’s worst floods in decades.
ENVIRONMENT: Climate Change Debate Rises with Pakistan Floods
"If this is not God’s wrath, what is?" 40-year-old taxi driver Bakht Zada said of the massive floods in Pakistan that have swept away his life earnings.
PAKISTAN: Endangered Snow Leopard Clawing Its Way Back
For more than 10 years, Shafqat Hussain has been on the trail of the endangered snow leopard. He has heard the beast’s growl, and has seen its pugmarks against a snowy track. But his dream, of coming eye-to-eye with the elusive nocturnal feline, remains unfulfilled. "If you’ve seen the cat, you’ve seen the Holy Grail," says Hussain.
PAKISTAN: Controversial Drug Welcomed by Some, Worries Others
With its latest hotline a surefire hit, the non-government group Aware Girls could not be any happier.RIGHTS-PAKISTAN: Film Gives Women Survivors A New Take on Life
"The first film I make when I go back to my village will be about unequal wages women peasants get compared to their male counterparts," says Haseena Mallah, an unlettered farmhand in her 40s.PAKISTAN: Life At A Time Of Suicide Bombings
Like any other Friday morning, hordes of people flocked at the shrine of 11th-century Sufi saint, Hazrat Ali Hajveri, that is near Bhaati Gate inside Lahore’s walled city on Jul. 2. By that afternoon, a much larger crowd had gathered at the site, this time for the usual Friday prayers.PAKISTAN: Depression, Poverty Make A Deadly Mix
She survived the nightmare, but three of her six children, as well as her husband, did not. In fact, Muzammil Akbar says, it was her husband Akbar Ali who had fed poison to their three eldest children before handing her a "handful of white tablets".
RIGHTS-PAKISTAN: Slowly, Women Gain Ground through Land Ownership
"I told my husband if he ever hits me (again), I’ll pack up and go to my parents who live just round the corner, and he will lose the land I got," says Jannat Gul of Tando Bagho village here in this southern Pakistani district. Her husband has not hit her for the past six months – since Gul became the owner of some 1.6 hectares of land.HEALTH-PAKISTAN: Children’s Cancer A Hidden Crisis
Her husband works as a nurse in one of Pakistan’s most prestigious private hospitals, but when their two-year-old daughter Mary was diagnosed with leukaemia, Sadaf John could only be thankful that the Children’s Cancer Hospital (CCH) existed in this country.
PAKISTAN: More Action, Less Words, Needed to Ease Population Bulge
While militancy, power outages and skyrocketing food prices hog the limelight in parliamentary and media discussions in Pakistan, health experts warn that it is a neglected issue – the population bulge – that will prove to be a more insidious problem.
PAKISTAN: The Other Side Of World Cup Footballs
England coach Fabio Capello has bemoaned the unpredictable trajectory of the Jabulani World Cup ball, calling it "the worst ball"in the history of the tournament. But labour rights groups have a greater complaint.
PAKISTAN: Water Trickles Back into Village, Thanks to Solar Desalination
Ismail Achar never thought a day would come when his island village would be reduced to a barren tract of land with hardly a drop of water to drink.PAKISTAN: Furore Over Leaked Tape Cause for Media Soul Searching
The continuing debate on the purported audiotape implicating Pakistani television anchor Hamid Mir, popular and controversial in equal measure, has raised serious concerns about the media amid calls for an impartial investigation to uncover the truth behind the recording.PAKISTAN: Women Intensify Push to Pass Law Against Acid Attacks
Almost seven years after Naila Farhat, 20, became another victim of an acid throwing attack by a spurned suitor, she is finally seeing more vigorous efforts toward the passage of a law seeking to amend existing legislation to reinforce protection of women against violent assaults.PAKISTAN: Lake Disaster Triggers New Displacements
Up until Saturday the Attabad Lake in northern Pakistan had been rising one metre every day and was thus on the verge of breaking its banks, observed Lieutenant General Nadeem Ahmed, chairman of the National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA).
RIGHTS-PAKISTAN: Green Initiative Gives Hope to the Disabled
Talib Hussain, 29, became the sole breadwinner of his family of seven after his father suffered a stroke that left him half paralysed. Hussain brings home 4,000 Pakistani rupees (about 47 U.S. dollars) monthly, which he dutifully turns over to his mother.
PAKISTAN: New Wage Hike a Mere Palliative, Say Labour Advocates
Imran Ali, 23, has no reason to complain. His monthly take home pay of 8,600 Pakistan rupees (about 102 U.S. dollars) as a government employee allows him to augment his family’s meagre income.
PAKISTAN: Lack of Access to Contraception, Abortion Persist
Perween Riaz, 36, waited till after she gave birth to her sixth child before she finally got herself sterilised.« Previous Page — Next Page »
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