Opinion: Will the SDGs Serve to Bridge the Gender Gap?

Increasingly gender equality, rooted in human rights, is recognized both as a key development goal on its own and as a vital means to helping accelerate sustainable development. And while the field of gender has expanded exponentially over the years, with programmes focused exclusively on women and girls and greater mainstreaming of gender into many development activities, a range of challenges remain.

Opinion: Africa’s Agricultural Potential Begins on the Ground

My friend Kofi Boa is a Ghanaian agronomist who is probably the biggest advocate for conservation farming in Africa. For decades, Kofi has taught farmers how to increase their yields using no-till, cover crops and other techniques.

Opinion: Having to Choose, A Nation’s Agonizing Immigration Duty

It’s auniversally acknowledged truth that no nation can sustain open borders. Even the wealthiest, most popular “nations of immigrants” like the US cannot possibly accept everyone who wants to immigrate here or even qualifies to do so.

Only 1325 National Plans will trigger the Resolutions Implementation

This week, the United Nations Security Council is holding an open debate to undertake its High Level Review of the 15 years of implementation of the landmark Resolution 1325 on “Women and Peace and Security.”

Opinion: Turn Words into Action Involving Women for Lasting Peace

We have recently celebrated the peace deal struck between the government in Colombia and the main guerrilla group. The deal reached on justice issues represents the clearest sign yet of a possible end to five decades of conflict.

A New Framework in an Age of Migration

With the worldwide numbers of displaced people at all-time highs, migration has become the watchword for humanitarian crises.

Opinion: International Day of the Girl Must Start with Good Laws

Everyday should be about girls, but yesterday, October 11, was dedicated especially to them. International Day of the Girl is yet another opportunity to put girls at center stage.

Opinion: Will African Leaders Fight for our Farmers?

Climate change is changing the world we know and love. Our land, homes and food are at risk. With nearly a billion people already living in poverty, it is also the single biggest threat to the fight against hunger.

Opinion: “Sanitation, Water & Hygiene For All” Cannot Wait for 2030

The new Sustainable Development Goals, agreed upon recently by the member states of the United Nations, are all interconnected, as has been reiterated time and again. However, it is in the new Goal 6 – “Ensure access to water and sanitation for all”—for which this interconnectedness is most apparent.

Analysis: India’s Challenge on the SDGs

India’s stance on sustainable development goals is evolving as there are differing voices on what should be done. Over the next 15 years, the global development agenda will be preoccupied with the ambitious challenge of achieving 17 SDGs and 169 targets. The SDGs follow the Millennium Development Goals which were conceptualized as a set of eight goals on diverse development dimensions including poverty alleviation, gender equality, health and environmental sustainability. The buzz in the development community is that as the relative success of MDGs is a result of China’s super-rapid growth, the relative success of the SDGs will be because of India.

TPP is “Worst Trade Agreement” for Medicine Access, Says Doctors Without Borders

“The TPP [Trans-Pacific Partnership] will…go down in history as the worst trade agreement for access to medicines in developing countries,” said Doctors without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) in a statement following the signing of the TPP trade deal.

Shale Drives Uncertain New Geoeconomics of Oil

The emergence of fracking has modified the global market for fossil fuels. But the plunge in oil prices has diluted the effect, in a struggle that experts in the United States believe conventional producers could win in the next decade.

Opinion: American Exceptionalism on Child Rights

On 1 October 2015, Somalia ratified the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC), leaving the United States of America as the only remaining member state of the UN not to embrace this most universally accepted human rights treaty. UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon reflects the sentiments of all the world’s human rights activists in encouraging the US to join the global community by ratifying this noble treaty.

U.S. 100th Member State to Join Nuke Terrorism Treaty

A 1997 movie titled “The Peacemaker” –partly shot outside the United Nations – dramatised the story of a Yugoslav terrorist who acquires a backpack-sized nuclear weapon, gone missing after a train wreck in rural Russia, and brings it to New York to detonate it outside U.N. headquarters.

Opinion: The Pope, Partisanship and the Common Good

Pope Francis delivered two very strong messages in his speech to Congress Thursday morning: let's work together and let's protect the vulnerable.

U.S., Russian Arms Supplies to Iraq, Syria a Blessing to Rebel Groups

The United States and Russia are escalating arms sales to two of their major allies in the Middle East – Iraq and Syria – despite fears that some of these weapons may ultimately wind up, ironically, in the hands of armed rebel groups battling government forces.

Activists Say Fracking Fails to ‘Keep Pennsylvania Beautiful’

U.S. activist Vera Scroggins has been sued five times by the oil industry, and since October 2013 she has faced a restraining order banning her from any properties owned or leased by one of the biggest players in Pennsylvania’s natural gas rush, Cabot Oil & Gas Corporation.

U.N. to Host Meeting of World Leaders on Refugee Crisis

The 28-member European Union (EU), which was sharply divided over the Greek bailout financial crisis last year, is facing its biggest test of unity over the growing refugee crisis unfolding in European borders.

Western Double Standards on Deadly Cluster Bombs

The 2008 Convention on Cluster Munitions (CCM) banned the use of these deadly weapons for two primary reasons: they release small bomblets over a wide area, posing extended risks beyond war zones, and they leave behind unexploded ordnance which have killed civilians, including women and children, long after conflicts have ended.

Opinion: Protecting Lives Must Come First in Law Enforcement

Everyone has the right to life. This principle is enshrined in Article 3 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and appears in numerous international treaties and national laws.

Europe Invaded Mostly by “Regime Change” Refugees

The military conflicts and political instability driving hundreds of thousands of refugees into Europe were triggered largely by U.S. and Western military interventions for regime change – specifically in Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya and Syria (a regime change in-the-making).