IPEF: Much Ado about Nothing

After 2.5 years, US President Joe Biden’s Indo-Pacific Framework for Prosperity (IPEF) is increasingly irrelevant due to its own limitations and broader US foreign policy shifts.

Playing Nuclear Games: Tickling the Tail of the Promethean Nuclear Fire Dragon

In recent years, the rhetoric, strategy and practice of nuclear deterrence has grown riskier, more urgent, more dangerous, less stable, and increasingly in the hands of deficient leaders and policymakers.

Agroecology: The Game-Changing Solution to Global Food, Climate and Conflict Crises

Edward Mukiibi, President of Slow Food, champions agroecology as a transformative answer to the world's most pressing crises: food insecurity, climate change, and violent conflicts. In a world where these challenges intersect, Mukiibi called for an urgent rethink of our approach to food systems. 

‘The Focus Should Be on Holding Social Media Companies Accountable, Not Punishing Individual Users’

 
CIVICUS discusses the recent Twitter/X ban in Brazil with Iná Jost, lawyer and head of research at InternetLab, an independent Brazilian think tank focused on human rights and digital technologies.

A Growing New Battle: Nuclear Weapons vs Conventional Arms

The warnings from the United Nations and from anti-nuclear activists are increasingly ominous: the world is closer to a nuclear war—by design or by accident—more than ever before. The current conflicts—and the intense war of words—between nuclear and non-nuclear states—Russia vs. Ukraine, Israel vs. Palestine and North Korea vs. South Korea—are adding fuel to a slow-burning fire.

“Escalation Dominance” . . . and the Prospect of More Than 1,000 Holocausts

Everything is at stake. Everything is at stake with nuclear weapons. While working as a nuclear war planner for the Kennedy administration, Daniel Ellsberg was shown a document calculating that a U.S. nuclear attack on communist countries would result in 600 million dead. As he put it later: “A hundred Holocausts.”

May Teacher Voices Echo Around the Globe

We must build a new social contract for education – a contract based on equality, equity, and universal human rights. At the center of our global efforts to ensure education for all, we must put teachers first in everything we do. They are frontlines heroes who deliver every day to educate children, cultivate young talent, and build a strong society. They are the substitute parents, the mentors and the ones who contribute to shaping the identify of a child in war, in refuge or in climate change.

The UN Cybercrime Convention: A New Repressive Tool in Disguise?

The UN Office on Drugs and Crime hailed the recently agreed Cybercrime Convention as a ‘landmark step’ in cooperating to tackle online dangers. But human rights organisations aren’t so sure.

Will Ukraine Benefit if IMF Ends its Punitive Fees on Debt Burdened Countries?

Over the coming month, the United States has a window of opportunity to lift a multi-billion-dollar burden from Ukraine, and other countries in financial distress, without costing the US taxpayer a dime.

Prostitution an ‘Egregious Violation of Human Rights’—UN Special Rapporteur

Reem Alsalem, the UN Special Rapporteur on Violence Against Women and Girls, calls prostitution a “system of violence” that does not benefit society at all, especially the women and girls forced into this system.

BRICS+ Prioritising Expansion to Fight Western Hegemony

In an interview with Sky News Arabia on September 20, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov expressed scepticism but was straight to the point about the strategic expansion of BRICS, an association comprising Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa. Under Russia's BRICS presidency which began in January 2024.

Nuclear Annihilation Threatened by Revival of 20h Century McCarthy Era Cold War & Red Scare

The world may have dodged an immediate bullet when the US intelligence agencies warned, this week, that by giving in to Ukraine’s pleading for long range missiles that could attack targets deep into Russia, we would be poking the Russian bear beyond its patience without even influencing the outcome of the war in Ukraine’s favor.

How the Geneva Consensus Declaration Threatens International Cooperation and Development

Last week, UN member states adopted the Pact of the Future – and its two annexes: the Global Digital Compact and the Declaration for Future Generations. These action-oriented documents are envisaged to counter emerging threats to development and acceleration of progress on Agenda 2030. Nonetheless, there remains little political prioritization of reproductive justice on this agenda.

Will the UN’s Pact of The Future Modernize the World’s Outdated Multilateral Systems?

While most world leaders who attended the United Nations inaugural Summit of the Future—a two-day high-level event at UN headquarters in New York meant to address the most pressing global challenges of the 21st century—agree that the world's aging multilateral system needs modernizing, not all agree on how to get there.

TikTok and WHO Join Efforts to Combat Misinformation

Today’s digital age is centered around TikTok, the short-form social media platform that hosts around 1 billion global users. Sensationalized or reductive videos often get the most engagement with young audiences, leading to the spread of misinformation on a global level.

Uptick in Mpox Cases Raises Concern Among Health Officials

Yesterday, India’s Federal Health Ministry reported the nation’s first documented case of mpox. The infected individual was reported to have contracted the clade Ib strain of the virus, which is a far deadlier variant than the more common clade II. This development has raised considerable concern among health officials around the world as the mpox epidemic had been contained in the Democratic Republic of Congo until recently.

Bangladesh’s Chief Advisor Addresses UNGA Calling for International Cooperation, Freedom and Rights

In his first major address at the United Nations, the Chief Advisor of Bangladesh’s interim government, Dr. Muhammad Yunus, appealed to the international community to engage with a ‘new Bangladesh’ in the shared efforts to cooperate on global issues. Yunus arrived earlier in the week to attend the 79th United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) in New York. In the four days he was here, Yunus held meetings with a range of world leaders, notably UN Secretary-General António Guterres and US President Joe Biden. This would indicate there is good support for him and what he represents. On Friday, Yunus addressed the General Assembly, speaking in his native language, Bangla.

Activists Call on World to ‘Imagine’ Peace, End Nuclear Arms

In any discussion of world peace and the future of humanity, the issue of nuclear arms must be addressed, and now. That was the message from a range of delegates at the “Imaginer la Paix / Imagine Peace” conference, held in Paris September 22 to 24, and organized by the Sant’Egidio Community, a Christian organization founded in Rome in 1968 and now based in 70 countries.

‘We Need Competitive Elections so Only Truly Committed States Are Elected to the UN Human Rights Council’

 
CIVICUS discusses the upcoming election of new members of the United Nations (UN) Human Rights Council with Madeleine Sinclair, New York Office Director and Legal Counsel at the International Service for Human Rights (ISHR).

World Governments, NGOs Announce $350m Investments in Sexual and Reproductive Health Services

On the heels of the Summit of the Future and the sidelines of the United Nations High-Level Meeting Week, governments and philanthropies pledged to commit at least USD 350 million to boost family planning, sexual and reproductive health and supplies on the national and global level. As enshrined in the newly-adopted Pact for the Future, seeking new international finance models is critical to solving the issues that the world faces today. The decision to pledge forward is a demonstration of commitment to ongoing health issues.