POLITICS: U.N. Decries Aid Shortfall in Afghanistan

The United Nations, which has expressed disappointment over the slow disbursement of development aid to crisis-stricken Afghanistan, has hurled one of its biggest political insults at Western donors: threatening to turn to a U.S. philanthropist for financial assistance.

AFRICA: Maternal Mortality, A Human Rights Catastrophe

The right to the highest attainable standard of health: not the most fashionable of human rights, but the limits on people's enjoyment of their right to health often coincide with continuing inequalities behind claims of economic growth or political reform.

HEALTH-SENEGAL: Fistula Sufferers Left To Their Fate

In Senegal's southern region, 58 percent of deliveries take place at home without any medical assistance, according to state reproductive health officials in Kolda, a town 425 km from the capital, Dakar. Women in the region suffer from exceptionally high rates of fistula.

RIGHTS: Queer Parade Defies Anachronistic Indian Law

"Not all females are women," reads a poster emblazoned in red. "I am the pink sheep of my family!" is the message on another, while a third, very cheekily proclaims, "I don’t give a f***, I am a greedy bisexual"!

INDONESIA: Presidential Poll Race Disappoints Women’s Activists

As the country prepares to elect its new president next week, Indonesian activists are trying to push gender issues onto the political agenda.

DOMINICAN REPUBLIC: Remittance Crunch, But Women Migrants Keep Sending

Among the colourful houses in the neighbourhood called Vietnam in East Santo Domingo, many families have at least one family member among the 1.5 million Dominicans living abroad.

RIGHTS: Arab TV Soaps Reinforce Gender Bias

Arabic TV channels wait for Ramadan, the Muslim month of fasting, to launch new soaps that generally portray women negatively. Ramadan starts this year at the end of August.

AUSTRALIA: Policy May Force Indigenous Communities From Traditional Lands

A government plan purporting to improve the lives of people living in isolated areas of Australia’s Northern Territory will be implemented at the expense of surrounding homeland communities and ignores the cultural and health benefits for people living on those traditional lands, warn critics.

CLIMATE CHANGE: 2020 Deadline Is the Crucial “Litmus Test”

"So who here thinks there will be a meaningful deal in Copenhagen?" Few of the more than 600 energy ministers, officials and experts from 80 countries attending the Vienna Energy Conference raised their hands in response to the conference moderator's question about the final round of climate negotiations this December in Copenhagen.

POLITICS: U.N. Plan for Financial Crisis Derided as Weak

When the General Assembly adopted a proposed plan of action aimed at overcoming the global financial crisis, one of the political surprises was that all 192 member states gave their blessings to the wide range of proposals spelled out in an "outcome document".

NEPAL: Third Gender Assert Rights

Two years ago, 23-year-old Bhakti Shah, a cadet in the Nepal Army, was dismissed because she was seen to spend most of her free time with a fellow female cadet.

CHILE: When Being a Woman is a “Health Risk”

As a woman of childbearing age, "I pay more than double what a man my age pays for the same health plan," 27-year-old Carolina Leyton told IPS.

WOMEN: Dubai, New Destination on Trafficking Map

On May 26, the U.S.-based Center for Investigative Reporting published ‘The Price of Sex’, a vast multi-media project by photojournalist Mimi Chakarova who spent nearly seven years doggedly unraveling the web of sex trafficking.

RIGHTS-PARAGUAY: Justice System Tackles Gender Violence

Paraguay’s justice system is seeking to address a major pending issue: eliminating the hurdles and inequalities in cases of violence against women. When victims turn to the police and the courts, instead of finding a solution, they are often only revictimised.

DEVELOPMENT: Not Another Missed Opportunity, Civil Society Urges

A coalition of civil society organisations called the Global Social Economy Group (GSEG) is pressing for the immediate and long-term financing needs of developing countries to take centre-stage at the U.N. Conference on the World Financial and Economic Crisis.

DEVELOPMENT: Green Energy for All by 2030?

While industrialised countries struggle to switch from climate-damaging, carbon-based energy to greener energy sources, much of the world is desperately energy poor, with 1.6 billion people having no access to electricity and 2.4 billion relying on wood and dung for heat and cooking.

ECONOMY: "Patching Up Bretton Woods Makes No Sense"

The world community must take immediate action to overhaul the current global financial system – that's what a vast majority of political leaders and policymakers from the developing world who are attending a three-day U.N. conference on the global economic crisis are saying.

DEVELOPMENT: Western Aid Declines, Financial Bailouts Mount

As the world's poorer nations warn about the gravity of the global financial crisis on their fragile economies, the United Nations has exposed the hypocrisy of Western donors who cry poverty even while they raise trillions of dollars to rescue their beleaguered financial institutions.

ASIA: Dams Across the Mekong Could Trigger a ‘Water War’

For now, the lower stretches of the Mekong River remain a symbol of peace and tranquillity in a region that was once bloodied by war. But for how long?

Q&A: Water Scarcity Threatens Half the Planet

If the world's governments fail to reach an immediate agreement on how to manage water resources by 2030, half the planet's population will not have enough water to survive, scientist Jonathan Baillie told Tierramérica.

ECONOMY: More Democracy the Cure for Broken System, U.N. Says

The United Nations General Assembly kicked off a three-day conference on the world financial crisis Wednesday with calls for a substantial overhaul of the decades-long model under which the world's richest countries set the terms of global fiscal and trade policy.