Adaptation Funding a Key Issue for Caribbean at Climate Talks

With less than six months to go before the next full United Nations Conference of the Parties also known as COP 21 – widely regarded as a make-or-break moment for an agreement on global action on climate change – Caribbean nations are still hammering out the best approach to the talks.

World’s Nuke Arsenal Declines Haltingly While Modernisation Rises Rapidly

The world’s stockpile of nuclear weapons, held by nine states, just got a little smaller.

Kidney Disease Treatment Not For All in Uganda

Vincent Mugyenyi, a 65-year-old retired pilot from the Ugandan Air Force, has lost count of how many dialysis treatment slots he has had to attend in the eight years he has been fighting chronic kidney disease.

Q&A: Better Students, Better Citizens, Better World: Education Is the Key to Peace

In a world where high levels of social and religious intolerance, conflicts, violent extremism and environmental degradation are threatening justice and peace, the United Nations is trying to find ways to maintain world order and promote sustainable development.

Rights Groups Call for Durable Solution for Europe’s Migrants

Human rights groups are calling for a sustainable solution to the migrant crisis in Europe, especially following the dismantling of refugee camps in Paris and Calais, France, over the past two weeks.

Sex Workers in Nicaragua Break the Silence and Gain Rights

After living in the shadows, thousands of Nicaraguan sex workers have broken their silence, won support from state institutions and gained new respect for their rights.

U.N. Urged to Put Global Citizenship at Centre of Post-2015 Development Agenda

When Denmark hosted the World Summit on Social Development (WSSD) in March 1995, one of the conclusions of that international gathering in Copenhagen was to create a new social contract with “people at the centre of development.”

Opinion: Journey Towards an African Taxation Renaissance

Africa is known as the ‘paradox of plenty’. How can a continent so rich in natural resources be so poor?

Organic Cacao Farmers Help Reforest Brazil’s Amazon Jungle

“Now we realise what a paradise we live in,” said Darcirio Wronski, a leader of the organic cacao producers in the region where the Trans-Amazonian highway cuts across the Xingú river basin in northern Brazil.

Infrastructure Investments in Emerging Economies Hit Record Levels – but at What Cost?

According to new data released by the World Bank Tuesday, investments in infrastructure in 139 emerging economies shot up to 107.5 billion dollars in 2014, with just five countries – Brazil, Colombia, India, Peru and Turkey – accounting for 73 percent of the total.

India Confronts Water Woes as it Transitions from MDGs to SDGs

As the United Nations closes its chapter on the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) and charts a new plan of action under the framework of 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), India – a country of 1.2 billion people – is confronting its resource challenges.

A Regional Foodbasket Plans for the Worst

Despite its highly variable climate, Guyana is the only Caribbean Community (CARICOM) country that enjoys food security. But rapid climate change could pose a challenge not only for Guyana, but for its Caribbean neigbours who depend on the South American country for much of their produce.

Rights Abuses Still Rampant in Bangladesh’s Garment Sector

Some say they were beaten with iron bars. Others confess their families have been threatened with death. One pregnant woman was assaulted with metal curtain rods.

Inequality Blocks Further Reduction in Child Mortality in Latin America

The progress that Latin America has made in reducing child mortality is cited by international institutions as an example to be followed, and the region has met the fourth Millennium Development Goal, which is to cut the under-five mortality rate by two thirds.

India Erupts Over Loopholes in Child Labour Law

In a bid to overhaul the country's child labour laws, the Indian government has banned the employment of children below 14 years of age in various commercial ventures, while permitting them to work in family enterprises and on farmlands after school hours and during vacations.

India’s Four Million Sex Workers Demand Equal Labour Rights

Although forced prostitution and trafficking of women remains a huge challenge in India, health experts, policy-makers and legal advocates say that most of the country’s estimated four million commercial sex workers join the trade of their own free will.

Fishing and Farming in Gaza is a Deadly Business

Three Palestinian fishermen were injured last week after Israeli naval forces opened fire on fishing boats off the coast of al-Sudaniyya in the northern Gaza Strip, bringing to 15 the number of farmers and fishermen shot and injured by Israeli security forces recently as they attempted to earn a living.

Exodus in the Bay of Bengal

For a while it went unnoticed: a boatload of migrants here, a vessel full of refugees there. But since 2012, the complex and unregulated movement of human beings through South and Southeast Asia– and the fate of those who put their lives in the hands of smugglers and at the mercy of the high seas – is becoming bleaker with each passing day.

Ni Una Menos – The Cry Against ‘Femicides’ Finally Heard in Argentina

In the wake of the massive response to their call to protest violence against women in Argentina, the organisers of this week’s demonstrations are starting to plan the steps to be taken to get results for their demand “Ni Una Menos” (not one less), taking advantage of the strength in numbers shown to obtain political support for public policies aimed at protecting women.

‘Legal Friends’ Fight Gender Violence in Rural India

Mamta Bai, 36, distinctly remembers the first time the police came to her village: it was December 2014 and her neighbour, Purva Bai, had just been beaten unconscious by her alcoholic husband, prompting Mamta to make a distress call to the nearest station.

Thirsty in Nicaragua, the Country Where ‘Agua’ Is Part of Its Name

Nicaragua, the Central American country with the most abundant water sources, and where water – “agua” in Spanish – is even part of its name, is suffering one of its worst water crises in half a century, fuelled by climate change, deforestation and erosion.