PAKISTAN: Ruined Farmers Say Children Won't Go to School

Fertile Swat's famous orchards of peach, plum and apple were just starting to ripen when the Pakistan military launched an air and land attack on Taliban fighters in end-April, uprooting tens of thousands of civilians.

POLITICS: Security Council Reform Remains Deadlocked

After 15 long years of closed-door bickering, the United Nations remains irrevocably deadlocked on how to revamp the most powerful political body in the Organisation: the 15-member Security Council.

HEALTH-SOUTH AFRICA: Wheeling and Healing

Every weekday morning, a stylish procession leaves the offices of MaAfrika Tikkun NGO in Delft, Cape Town; bumps and jolts through the gravel entry gates; then hits the tar and scatters into every corner of the township...

HEALTH-AFGHANISTAN: Patients at Private Doctors' Mercy

Thirty five-year-old Habibulah Khan walks out of a private clinic in the Afghan capital, covered in dust and looking dog-tired.

HEALTH-AFGHANISTAN: Private Care – Designed to Make Money

Forty five-year-old Rahima thought she was going to die. Her family had checked her into Shenuzada, a private hospital in Makroyan in the Afghan capital, for an operation on her abdomen.

AGRICULTURE: Cultivating Rural Prosperity in Cameroon

Emilie Nyate has a two million CFA smile on her face these days. She's one of the beneficiaries of the Roots and Tubers Market- Oriented Programme, known better by its French acronym of PNDRT, which is transforming the lives of small-scale farmers in Cameroon.

Q&A: ‘We Do Not Want to See The Blame Game’

Developing economies are vulnerable to climate change and need funds to implement much needed adaptation and mitigation measures. This is one of the key points that needs to be addressed during the next round of U.N.-led negotiations on climate change in Copenhagen, according to Mohamed Aslam, Maldives Minister of Housing, Transport and Environment.

HEALTH: Fighting AIDS in Conservative Mauritania

Campaigners against HIV/AIDS in Mauritania face an uphill task to put their messages across, especially those that deal with safer sex and condom use. Campaigners have to cut corners in order to avoid angering the country's powerful religious clerics.

ENERGY-CAMEROON: Dam Project Questioned

Construction has begun on a new dam at the confluence of the Lom and Pangar rivers in Cameroon. The government is pushing the project as key to addressing an energy shortfall, allowing for economic growth; observers believe the plan may only increase the country's vulnerability to drought.

CAMEROON: Fears for Forest as Dam Construction Begins

Crouched on a low wooden stool in front of his mud hut in the village of Pangar, Alain Selembe puffs away at his clay pipe, his gaze lost in the surrounding forest, quite oblivious to the noise made by his two playing daughters. All he hears is the rumbling of bulldozers opening up a 30 kilometre road from Deng Deng village to the confluence of the Lom and Pangar rivers, where the government plans to construct a new dam.

CLIMATE CHANGE: 75 Million Environmental Refugees to Plague Asia-Pacific

Pacific Islanders, aiming to secure their very survival, are calling for immediate commitments from the developed world to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by at least 45 percent by 2020.

POLITICS-NEPAL: Women Push for Gender Equality in New Constitution

A political crisis, which has dragged on for months, crippling progress in drafting a new constitution for Nepal by the Constituent Assembly (CA) has considerably dampened the euphoria of women's organisations here.

HAITI: Aid Flowing, But Food Crisis Drags On

Though beleaguered with their own financial problems, donor countries say they are not planning to withdraw financial support for cash-strapped Haiti.

PARAGUAY: Indigenous Squatter Communities Organise Self-Help

Indigenous families living in a squatter settlement on the outskirts of the Paraguayan capital are organising themselves, and now have a community soup kitchen and are producing and selling handicrafts. They don't want to return to panhandling on the streets of Asunción, so far from their home villages.

TANZANIA: Solutions to Dar's Water Problems in the Pipeline

In the nine months since she moved to the Dar es Salaam neighbourhood of Kinondoni, Anna Christopher has only seen water running from her taps once.

RIGHTS: U.N. Body Relentlessly Pursues Women's Equality

The U.N. Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) is known to publicly castigate countries accused of gender discrimination or violating international conventions governing women's rights.

WATER-TANZANIA: Who Pays the Piper?

When John Rubara* and his family moved into their new house in Dar es Salaam's Tabata Kimanga, a fast-growing middle-income neighbourhood in Temeke district, the water company disconnected their supply because the previous owner was in arrears.

HEALTH-AFRICA: Early ART: A Stitch in Time…

A global call to put people living with HIV on antiretroviral therapy (ART) at an earlier stage of their illness is intensifying, but most developing countries, especially in Africa, are struggling to meet the current recommendations.

MOROCCO: Farmers Overcome Water Scarcity

Researchers in the central Moroccan region Beni Mellal are introducing new agricultural techniques that increase production while reducing water usage.

ECONOMY-RWANDA: Credit for Women's Development

In early July, Rwandan officials announced a new programme that aims to strengthen women's economic capacity by providing more access to credit and enabling them to start income generating projects.

ZIMBABWE: Water Rationing Looms in Bulawayo

Bulawayo city council is to tighten a water rationing programme relaxed last year because residents are rapidly pushing up the city's daily consumption by using municipal water supplies for non-domestic activities.