Looking to Cameroon’s Women Senators

Marlyse Aboui, a 40-year-old nurse, has still not gotten over the astonishment she felt when she heard that Cameroon’s President Paul Biya had nominated her to the senate.

Turkey’s Excessive Neo-liberalism Threatens ‘Peace at Home’

"Peace at home, peace in the world" is the official motto of the Turkish Republic. Coined in 1931 by the republic's founder, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, it implies a causal relationship, but the events this week in Istanbul and dozens of other cities of Turkey suggest that causality can work in reverse order, too.

Children Help Take Care of Havana Bay

On a piece of paper, Jennifer Rivas draws a beach, with little girls carrying bags of trash and signs that say “Let’s take care of the environment.” The 10-year-old is part of an educational programme, Friends of the Bay, that involves 322 schools in the Cuban capital.

“Syria Peace Meeting Will Not Happen in June”: UN Envoy

A conference on ending the fighting in Syria will not happen in June, as planned, because both sides in the conflict are unprepared to attend, the U.N.'s international envoy Lakhdar Brahimi said.

In Besieged Refugee Camp, Syrian Medics Struggle to Provide

It was nine in the morning when the shell landed in front of nine-year-old Hella al-Abtah's house in the Yarmouk Palestinian refugee camp in Damascus. Hella survived the initial blast but was critically wounded in the head, and her father rushed her to the Palestine Hospital, blood pouring from the laceration.

46 Years on, Arab-Israeli War Still Leaving Its Mark

Majda el-Batsch was eight years old in June 1967 when she heard about the war that year. "I didn't know what war meant," she recalled. More than four decades later, the Palestinian reporter is still grappling with the meaning of what is known as the Six-Day War.

Landgrabbing to Provide Horn of Africa with Electricity

Ethiopia’s long-term hydropower strategy is proving to be both a source of economic sustenance and contention. In becoming Africa’s leading power exporter through the construction of a series of dams across the country, Ethiopia could threaten the lives of millions who depend on the Nile River’s waters.

Palestinian Child Labourers Face Grim Future

Hazem Maher, 16, from Hebron in the southern West Bank, works a backbreaking 12-hour day in the fruit and vegetable market in the city of El Bireh, next to Ramallah. He earns just over 15 dollars a day as a porter.

Gay Parents in Cuba Demand Legal Right to Adopt

Many lesbians and gays in Cuba find different ways of achieving their dream of becoming mothers and fathers and forming families. But this is complicated in a country where neither civil unions nor adoption by non-heterosexual persons are legally recognised.

Ecuador’s Fragile Páramo Ecosystem Threatened by Climate Change

The “páramos” or high plateaus of Ecuador, a crucial source of water, are showing signs of extreme fragility and a troubling loss of capacity to conserve this vital resource and sustain the survival of numerous species found nowhere else on earth.

Q&A: “The State Does Not Lose Sovereignty If It Respects Indigenous Rights”

"There is a belief that consent is about saying yes or no, about who wins," observed James Anaya, the United Nations special rapporteur on indigenous rights. But consultation with indigenous peoples is a matter of “creating open processes where they can voice their opinions and influence decisions, and where there is the necessary will to seek consensus.”

Q&A: Iran’s Medical Shortages: Who’s Responsible?

For two years, reports have surfaced describing medical supply shortages in Iran, some with devastating consequences, as debate continues to rage about who's responsible - the Iranian government or the sanctions regime.

U.N. Can Help Devalue Nukes as Geopolitical Currency

When the 193-member U.N. General Assembly (UNGA) holds is first-ever high-level meeting on nuclear disarmament next September, there is little or no hope that any of the nuclear powers will make a firm commitment to gradually phase out or abandon their lethal arsenals.

U.S., China Seek Common Ground on North Korea

U.S. President Barack Obama is set to host his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping on Jun. 7-8 for their first bilateral meeting as heads of state. Figuring on their agenda is how to address a precarious North Korea, which is armed with a small nuclear arsenal and vying for a bigger one.

The Battle to Save DRC’s Mothers

"Many hospitals and health centres" that are not run by NGOs "do not meet health standards," according to Dominique Baabo, provincial medical inspector for North Kivu province in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo.

Syrian Rebel Setbacks Spur Renewed Talk of No-Fly Zones

A series of reversals for Syria’s rebels this month has prompted its supporters here to call for much greater U.S. military intervention in the civil war in order to give them a stronger bargaining position in advance of any peace negotiations.

Peak Water, Peak Oil…Now, Peak Soil?

Soil is becoming endangered.This reality needs to be part of our collective awareness in order to feed nine billion people by 2050, say experts meeting here in Reykjavík.

Mexico’s Desaparecidos: Unspoken, Unseen, Unknown

The last time Enrique Rangel heard his brother Héctor's voice was on the night of Nov. 10, 2009, when he called and said “they’re coming, they already stopped me and asked for money, and I already paid, but they’re coming.”

Reactions to Gay Marriage Contradict French, Portuguese Stereotypes

The heated reaction to the legalisation of same-sex marriage has run counter to the widespread image of France as the cradle of the modern republic and equal rights since the 1789 revolution. In contrast, Portugal with its reputation for prudishness, has shown itself to be much more open and tolerant.

Sex Educators Struggle to Break Taboos

Liberian journalist Mae Azango says she spent a year living “like a bat, going from tree to tree” with her daughter in order to escape religious fanatics who were threatening to kill her for exposing the practice of female genital mutilation in her home country last year.

U.N. Panel Projects a Poverty-Free World by 2030

A U.N.-commissioned high-level panel of eminent persons, led by three world leaders, has moved the goal posts for the halving of extreme poverty and hunger: from the current 2015 deadline to a new targeted date of 2030.