KARACHI, Nov 12 2009 (IPS) – As militant attacks in Pakistan continue unabated, there are increasing calls for the government to rethink its strategy—and look deep within.
What is happening in Pakistan today is an unprecedented situation and the government’s lack of planning and imagination left it with no alternative, said I.A. Rehman, director of the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP).
Noted peace activist Dr Pervez Hoodbhoy called the government authorities irresponsible for creating paranoia among the people. They constantly accuse external powers for the present spate of terrorism.
October has seen the worst violence in Pakistan this year as a result of a string of attacks that preceded the army offensive against the militants in South Waziristan o…
Saaleha Bamjee-Mayet
JOHANNESBURG, Dec 2 2009 (IPS) – Growing up in Cameroon, Joseph-Antoine Bell and his friends used to think that by playing football they could get rid of malaria.
Charles Ssali (r) and Joseph-Antoine Bell are two footballers supporting a campaign using sport to help fight malaria. Credit: Saaleha Bamjee-Mayet
Like showering and breathing, …
Susan Anyangu-Amu
NAIROBI, Jan 14 2010 (IPS) – A harmonised draft constitution has now been handed over to Kenya s Parliamentary Select Committee. Influential Christian leaders are warning that the question of abortion could derail the constitutional review process.
Thousands of young women risk their health procuring a…
Zack Baddorf*
LONDON, Feb 18 2010 (IPS) – A new documentary Diary of a Disgraced Soldier follows the dismissal from the British army of an Iraq war veteran and his battle with post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) linked to his videographing the brutalising of Iraqi youth by fellow servicemen.
Disgraced Soldier. Credit: Martin Webster
For five days in 2004, Corporal Martin Webster and about 100 other British soldiers from the 1st Battalion, Light Infantry, were under siege by thousands of rioting Iraqis in the streets of Al Amara, Iraq. While some Iraqis threw stones, others fired rock…
Thalif Deen
UNITED NATIONS, Mar 22 2010 (IPS) – At the United Nations, water and sanitation have remained inseparable twins on the world body s social and economic agenda.
Still, and despite the General Assembly s declaration of 2008 as the International Year of Sanitation, water gets higher political priority than toilets.
Simply put, Serena O Sullivan of the London-based End Water Poverty told IPS bluntly, nobody wants to talk about s t.
And that includes politicians and U.N. diplomats, which is dangerous , she complains.
As the world commemorated World Water Day on Monday, the U.N. s Deputy Secretary-General Asha-Rose Migiro said 2.6 billion people worldwide still lack adequate sanitation.
Seven out of 10 people without improved sanitation…
Isaiah Esipisu
LUBUMBASHI, Apr 26 2010 (IPS) – Eight faith-based organisations have set up a pilot project in the Democratic Republic of Congo to support the fight against malaria.
<img title="Drug-resistant parasites are rendering traditional drugs ineffective.
Drug-resistant parasites are rendering traditional drugs ineffective. Credit: John Robinson/IPS
The initiative, dubbed the Coalition of Religious Organisations for Health (CORESA, after its French acronym) will receive some money from the Global Fund for HIV/AIDS, Malaria and Tuberculosis, as well as raise money independently for malaria prevention.
CORESA will see Catholics, Methodists, and Anglicans; Seventh Day Adventists, Apostolics and members of the DRC s Kimbanguiste Church, as well as t…
Marwaan Macan-Markar
BANGKOK, Jun 4 2010 (IPS) – As it took root in the rice fields across Asia, it was hailed as the solution to the hunger afflicting millions of people in the region. But four decades on, the much vaunted Green Revolution appears to have reached its limits, unable to meet new demands, to feed new mouths.
United Nations food experts are increasingly touting the region s chronic hunger figures for 2009 to confirm this reality. Last year saw the proportion of people in the grip of chronic hunger hit 17 to 18 percent in the Asia- Pacific region, up from 16 percent in 2006.
It was the first time that the number of the hungry had risen since the Green Revolution spurred a downward trend. The Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) warned this week of a ch…
Zofeen Ebrahim
KARACHI, Pakistan, Jul 6 2010 (IPS) – While militancy, power outages and skyrocketing food prices hog the limelight in parliamentary and media discussions in Pakistan, health experts warn that it is a neglected issue the population bulge that will prove to be a more insidious problem.
Pakistan s population policy is still waiting final approval. Credit: Fahim Siddiqi/IPS
Population is the denominator for everything , says Sania Nishtar, president of Heartfile, a think tank conside…
Thalif Deen
UNITED NATIONS, Jul 28 2010 (IPS) – When the United Nations General Assembly adopted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) back in December 1948, 58 member states voted for a historic document covering political, economic, social and cultural rights.
A young girl in Côte d Ivoire fills a family water clay pot…
Evelyn Matsamura Kiapi
KAMPALA, Aug 26 2010 (IPS) – Health rights activists still insist that, despite some improvements to Uganda s controversial Anti-Counterfeiting Bill, it will affect the availability of generic medicine if enacted in present form.
The bill has been improved with regard to the functions of different enforcement agencies. In the first draft there was confusion about the roles of various agencies.
The first draft of the bill gave the Uganda National Bureau of Standards (UNBS) the mandate to seize and detain suspected counterfeit goods, a function already fulfilled by the Uganda National Drug Authority (NDA).
The NDA was established under the National Drug Policy and Authority Act of 1993 with a mandate to safeguard the appropriate use of dru…