SRI LANKA: Journalists Fight a Separate War

While Sri Lanka’s armed forces battle Tamil Tiger rebels in the north, sections of the country’s media are embroiled in a war of a different kind - a fight to pursue their mission as journalists.

RIGHTS-AUSTRALIA: Concerns Over New Indigenous People’s Body

Indigenous Australians have largely welcomed the government’s scrapping of the controversial National Indigenous Council (NIC) to make way for a new representative body.

RIGHTS-CHINA: Tibet Protests Won't Slow Olympic Torch

A crackdown on Tibetans protesting against Chinese rule over their Himalayan homeland - in the ancient capital of Lhasa and other Tibetan cities - is beginning to parallel the brutal suppression of the 1989 Tiananmen pro-democracy demonstrations.

RIGHTS: Amid Lhasa Protests, Tibetans Begin Journey Home

The soft glow of candles illuminated a sea of red-robed monks and nuns as they walked at sunset, followed by local residents and foreign tourists, as the sonorous sound of chanting filled the narrow main street of McLeod Ganj here in the home of the government-in-exile of Tibet.

ARGENTINA: TV Serial Raises Awareness on Trafficking in Women

The soap opera has proved itself an effective medium for portraying social problems in Latin America, and now a popular one in Argentina is addressing an issue on which the news broadcasts have remained silent: the disappearance of women for commercial sexual exploitation.

LATIN AMERICA: Blogging the Bicentennial

Three women and four men from Mexico, between the ages of 22 and 25, have begun a journey through seven Latin American countries to document the commemorations in 2009 and 2010 of the bicentennial of independence of the region’s countries from Spain, in videos, still photography and text.

CULTURE-US: High Fashion Still a “White Affair”

Supermodel Tyson Beckford was disappointed with New York's 2008 Fashion Week, and not because he had a problem with the designs, patterns, fabrics or materials used. Instead, he was critical of the model selection.

POLITICS-MALAYSIA: Anwar Ibrahim – Man of the Match

Anwar Ibrahim, the man credited with radically changing the political landscape of Malaysia, could not contest the Mar. 8 general elections that saw the ruling coalition lose five state governments and its long-held two-thirds majority in parliament.

ENVIRONMENT-BRAZIL: Development Vs. Preservation in Florianopolis

With marvellous exceptions like the south and other historic and natural nooks and crannies, the island of Florianopolis in southeastern Brazil is not the same place visitors found 20 years ago.

CLIMATE CHANGE: Most Vulnerable Left to Sink or Swim

The world's minorities and indigenous groups are the "silent victims" of the potentially disastrous effects of climate change, says a new study by Minority Rights Group (MRG) International.

ENVIRONMENT-INDIA: Tribal Rights Won’t Trouble Tiger Health

Walking through morning sunlight streaming through tall teak trees, A.K. Singh deputy conservator of forests, points out the ‘core, critical tiger habitat’ in the heart of this sprawling national park.

DEATH PENALTY-JAPAN: No &#39Conveyor Belt&#39 Executions – Abolitionists

Abolitionist lawmakers in Japan are appealing to the international community to pressure their government to end the rising number of death sentences and hangings - alarmed at how support for their stand at home appears to be dwindling.

RIGHTS-IRAN: Int’l Women’s Day Celebrations on Mute

Suppression of women’s movements and refusal to allow women to rally in public places by Iran’s hard line rulers kept celebrations of this year’s International Women’s Day confined to small gatherings in private residences.

LABOUR-JAPAN: Foreign Workers&#39 Grievances Erupt At Rally

With its own population both aging and declining, Japan needs migrant workers to sustain its economy. But the government’s failure to formulate an accommodative policy was evident at a rally in the capital on Sunday attended by some 300 foreign workers.

POLITICS-MALAYSIA: Voters Go Secular, Snub Ruling Coalition

Malaysia's ruling National Front (NF) coalition has suffered its biggest setback in five decades of unbroken power, losing five state governments and the two-thirds majority it enjoyed in national parliament.

WOMEN&#39S DAY-KENYA: Equal Pay in Theory, Not Always in Fact

On Mar. 8, a century ago, thousands took to the streets of New York in demonstrations aimed at improving life for women. Burning issues of the day included the need for better working conditions - higher pay, a shorter work day - and winning the right to vote.

RIGHTS-PAKISTAN: Women Push For Political Space In Patriarchy

Saeeda Anwar is a 38-year-old Pakistani schoolteacher. She works in a school here in the capital of the North West Frontier Province (NWFP), but she is not allowed to exercise her franchise.

RIGHTS-JAPAN: Doctor’s Abuse Revives Calls For Jail Reforms

A complaint of medical abuse, filed against a prison doctor by 22 inmates of a high security jail, has revived the wider issue of penitentiary reforms in a country that lays emphasis on rigorous discipline for repeat offenders.

PAKISTAN: Suicide Bombers – Chickens Coming Home to Roost

The assassination on Monday of the surgeon-general of Pakistan’s armed forces in the garrison town of Rawalpindi has brought home the enormity of the threat posed by suicide bombers - once nurtured by the establishment to fight the enemies of Islam in Afghanistan and Kashmir.

HEALTH: &#39Chronic Diseases Bigger Threat Than Terrorism&#39

International health experts and activists are calling for immediate global action to avert the looming epidemic of preventable chronic diseases which will kill 388 million people in the next decade, threatening economies in the developed and developing worlds.

RIGHTS-LATIN AMERICA: Men Have Gender Issues, Too

Although it may seem obvious, the need to involve men in the effort to attain gender equality is not clear to everyone in Latin America and the Caribbean, where quite a few people think it is an issue that mainly concerns the women’s rights movement.