Post-Arab Spring Democratic Gains at Risk, Group Warns

Almost two years after popular uprisings swept across the Middle East and North Africa, rights advocates are warning that ominous backsliding is taking place in countries across the region and beyond.

Q&A: “Pacification of Favelas Not a Real Public Policy Yet”

The “pacification” of the favelas in this Brazilian city, aimed at driving out armed groups and fighting drug trafficking, has not yet become a fully effective public policy, says Eliana Sousa Silva, who has lived in one of Rio’s shantytowns for nearly 30 years.

Suu Kyi Backs Lifting of Final U.S. Sanctions on Myanmar

Speaking on Tuesday at her first public address in the United States, Myanmar’s opposition leader, Aung San Suu Kyi, said that she supported the lifting of the last remaining U.S. economic sanctions on her country, but also warned that all remaining political prisoners need to be released.

Occupy Marks Anniversary Amid Grim Economic Climate

Amid a heavy police presence, thousands of anti-capitalist activists in marked the one-year anniversary of the Occupy Wall Street movement against the U.S. political and economic system, which they say favours billionaires at the expense of the middle and working class.

Little Concern for the Environment in EU-Central America Agreement

The Association Agreement between Central America and the European Union (EU) will increase environmental and social pressures on the region, warn experts and activists. But some observers stress its potentially positive impacts.

Tractors Revolutionise Agriculture in Chad

Chad has more than 400,000 square kilometres of arable land, but poor rainfall and a reliance on basic agricultural techniques have left the country with a grain deficit in the past two years. The government is turning to mechanisation in a bid to improve harvests.

India Coaxes Tribal Girls Into Schools

The deafening din of the lunch gong is sweet music to the 200-odd tribal girls rushing down the stairway, clutching stainless steel plates and tumblers.

Taking Justice to the Neighbourhoods in Argentina

The Argentine government has opened legal aid centres in slum neighbourhoods, to provide a range of services, from assistance for immigrants and victims of domestic violence to dental care services.

Saving the Lives of Malawi’s Children

Three-month-old Simplicious Gift lives in Mafunga village in Malawi’s southern rural district of Chikhwawa, 48 kilometres from the commercial capital, Blantyre. His is a poor farming village of about 1,200 people who live off their harvests and the produce from their livestock of goats, pigs and cows.

Fears for Food Security Rise with West African Floodwaters

Hundreds of thousands of people have been affected by heavy flooding along the Niger River over the last few weeks. Niger, Mali and Benin have been particularly hard hit, with dozens of deaths, tens of thousands of houses destroyed and vast areas of farmland submerged by rising waters.

Pakistan Factory Blaze Points to Poor Safety Standards, Corruption

The inferno that killed over 250 people at a garments factory in Karachi’s Baldia Town on Sept. 11 has raised questions over not just poor workplace safety standards in industry but massive corruption in government which leads to the flouting of building laws.

Rio Summit’s Legacy Still a Question Mark

Academics gathered in Washington on Wednesday suggested that the mixed experience at the U.N. Conference on Sustainable Development, held in Rio de Janeiro in June, has increased the importance of citizen engagement and consumer accountability in issues of environment, renewable energy and sustainability.

U.N. Doubles Down on Slashing Child Mortality by 2015

While the global community made progress in reducing under-five child mortality to below seven million per year, it risks failing to reach the global targets set for 2015 if action is not scaled up, according to a new report released by the U.N. children's agency UNICEF Thursday.

Laissez-Faire Failing World’s Dwindling Water Resources

Growing water shortages in many countries are a major threat to global security and development and should be a top priority at the U.N. Security Council, a panel of experts said in a new report.

In U.S. Politics, Economic Class Speaks Loudest

New research drawn from the past half-century offers one of the clearest pictures yet of the correlation between political involvement and socioeconomics in the United States, while underscoring the significant implications of recent legal and legislative changes for marginalised groups.

Ecotourism Helps Amazon Jungle Communities Survive

The Tsimane Mosetene people in Bolivia’s Amazon jungle region have found a tool to preserve their habitat and way of life: a community ecotourism project that won a United Nations-sponsored international award.

“Two Children May Have Died for You to Have Your Mobile Phone”

"It’s possible that two children died so that you could have that mobile phone,” says Jean-Bertin, a 34-year-old Congolese activist who wants to end the “absolute silence” around the crimes committed in his country to exploit strategic raw materials like coltan.

Polygamy Throttles Women in Senegal

Fatou (40), Awa (32) and Aissatou Gaye (24) sit in a meditative mood on the tiled floor outside their matrimonial home in Keur Massar, a township in the Senegalese capital Dakar.

‘Misoprostol – Must for Reducing Maternal Mortality’

“I can’t imagine life without misoprostol,” says Dr. Azra Ahsan, a gynaecologist and obstetrician who has, for more than a decade, been using the controversial drug to stop women from bleeding to death after delivery.

OP-ED: Women and Girls at Heart of the Blue Revolution

World Water Week recently concluded in Stockholm with a special emphasis on the linkages between water and food security.

Kenya’s Water Wars Kill Scores

Water scarcity is fuelling deadly inter-ethnic wars that continue to claim lives in Kenya, according to government officials. And if nothing is done to educate communities on how to conserve the valuable resource, the situation will escalate, governance experts and environmentalists warn.