Kashmir Conflict Spares Wildlife

Thousands of people have died in 20 years of turmoil in Kashmir in northern India, but the conflict seems to have spared the animal population, particularly the severely endangered Kashmir stag or "hangul" whose population has grown in recent years.

IRAN: Protests Mark Two-Year Anniversary of Contentious Polls

A silent protest through the streets of Tehran under the watchful eyes of a heavy security presence marked the second anniversary of Iran's June 2009 contested polls Sunday, amid a growing rift between Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei and President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, and among different conservative wings preparing to compete in the March 2012 Parliamentary elections.

JAPAN: Aid Cut to Hit Health Campaigns

International campaigns against AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria are headed for cuts in funding assistance, now that Japan is reducing its Overseas Development Assistance (ODA) budget in the wake of the disaster that hit the country in March.

PAKISTAN: Women Shield Children From Extremism

When Farah’s 16-year-old son began to disappear for several nights a week without saying where he went, she was naturally worried. After he returned one day and shattered the television screen in their Peshawar home, the mother of three decided it was time to quit her job as a teacher and to find out what was making her youngest child so angry.

INDIA: A School of Hope for Nomad Children

High up in the Himalayan mountains, 13-year-old Mohammad Junaid helps his family collect fresh fodder for their buffaloes, all the while dreaming of the day he could once again play cricket.

INDIA: Gandhism Returns to Fight Corruption

Almost 65 years after Mahatma Gandhi used "satyagraha" or "truth force" to lead a movement against British rule in India, Gandhism is back, this time facing an enemy more pernicious than colonialism: corrupt politicians, bureaucrats and businessmen stashing stolen wealth abroad.

Death Penalty Popular in China

Despite government efforts to curb the number of people it puts to death, China continues to execute more people than the rest of the world combined, and corporal punishment remains popular among the citizenry.

SRI LANKA: A Life Lost in Protest Against Pension Bill

Even before 22-year-old Sri Lankan worker Roshen Chanaka was pronounced dead at the Colombo North Hospital on Jun. 1, a large contingent of military personnel had moved in to secure the building. And to the small undertaker’s premises to which his body was later brought, the soldiers followed.

INDIA: Despite Fears of a Bubble, Microfinance Needed for Growth

Sambari Naik never went to school and is determined to give her daughter Rebati an education. But 13-year-old Rebati seldom did well in her studies, often dozing over her books beside a flickering and smoky kerosene wick lamp in their house, which had no electricity.

SRI LANKA: Water Washes Away Some Conflict

It was the second anniversary of Sri Lanka’s bloody war that ended on May 19, 2009, but for 23-year-old Fathima Imsana, there were more pressing things to do than celebrate two years of peace.

OP-ED: The Great Land Grab: India’s War on Farmers

Land is life. It is the basis of livelihoods for peasants and indigenous people across the Third World and is also becoming the most vital asset in the global economy.

PAKISTAN: Tribes Plead for End to Army Offensives

Fear and anxiety have spread among residents of North Waziristan in northwest Pakistan after U.S. Admiral Mike Mullen, outgoing Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, announced that the Pakistani government would launch a major offensive in the area.

Ahmadinejad’s Subsidy Reductions Squeeze Iran’s Producers

Owners of industrial and agricultural enterprises who initially welcomed Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's plan to reduce subsidies by lifting the price-support system for basic goods have now become its chief critics.

PAKISTAN: Lonely for Women Who Succeed

As you climb the ladder at the workplace, from the mid-management level to the senior leadership positions, you find fewer and fewer women. Little wonder then that Naz Khan - chief finance officer at Engro Fertilizers, a subsidiary of one of Pakistan’s largest conglomerates, Engro Corporation - says it gets lonely at the top.

McCain Cold to Warmer U.S.-Burma Ties

If Burma’s quasi-civilian government was hoping for warmer ties with the U.S. government, Senator John McCain’s visit to this South-east Asian nation has placed such hopes on ice.

SRI LANKA: Plan to Host 2018 Commonwealth Games Opposed

Sri Lanka plans to host the Commonwealth Games seven years from now and spend two billion dollars, in what politicians and economists slam as another extravagant adventure aimed at boosting President Mahinda Rajapaksa.

DEATH PENALTY-INDIA: Clemency Denial Opens Can of Worms

In a country where capital punishment is rare, human rights activists are surprised by a sudden move to hang a Sikh separatist militant convicted for bombing attacks on a senior police officer and a Congress party politician in the early 1990s.

Sexuality No More Comic in Japan

As of July, Japanese minors will no longer be able to buy comic books featuring children portrayed as violent or as sexual objects, under an ordinance enacted by the Tokyo Metropolitan Government last December.

TAIWAN: No Indictment Over Wrongful Execution

Taiwan prosecutors certified that Air Force private Chiang Kuo-ching had been wrongfully executed in August 1997 for the rape-murder of a five-year-old-girl at an air force headquarters compound in Taipei, but failed to indict any of the nine military officers responsible for extracting his "confession" through torture.

MEDIA-PAKISTAN: What Price Truth

When journalist Umar Cheema, 35, first heard of the death of his colleague Syed Saleem Shahzad, considered an expert on Al-Qaeda and Taliban militants, on May 31, he could not help but relive his day-long captivity with one of Pakistan’s intelligence agencies last year on Sept. 4.

INDIA: Unwed Tribal Mothers Seek Aid

For Janu, walking the streets to beg for alms is the only option for survival. After all, she has a two-year-old daughter to feed, and she herself, at 14 years old, is little more than a child.