By Inter Press Service Correspondents | KATHMANDU/PESHAWAR, Pakistan (IPS) – The goal is an ambitious one – to deliver a polio-free world by 2018. Towards this end, the multi-sector Global Polio Eradication Initiative (GPEI) is bringing out the big guns, sparing no expense to ensure that “every last child” is immunised against the crippling disease. […]
Archives for January 2015
What would Happen if the Int’l Criminal Court Indicted Israel’s Netanyahu?
By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) — If the International Criminal Court takes up Israeli government actions in the occupied Palestinian territories, it could well find specific officials guilty of breaches of the Rome Statute of 2002. Article 7 forbids “Crimes against Humanity,” which are systematically repeated war crimes. Among these offenses is murder, forcible […]
Indian Green Start-ups: Solar Backpacks & Daily Micropayments,
NDTV Prime | “Head’s Up” | — “Harvesting renewable energy, solar power, waste management – these concepts have been much explored across the world in the last decade. But has India made its presence felt in this field? Maybe not in the last few years, but now things are changing around. Upcoming start-ups are giving […]
Iraq Faces Women’s Crisis: 1 Mn. Widows, Extremist Captives, Child Brides
By Alaa Latif | Sulaymaniyah | (Niqash.org) Bayan Nouri has a tough job over the next four years – the new Minister for Women’s Affairs in Iraq must try to improve the economic lot of Iraq’s women, prevent systemic domestic violence against females and work on problems like female genital mutilation and underage marriage as […]
Allied Footage of Istanbul from 1915 in WW I
British Pathe | — “Footage from 1915 of Constantinople, in the Ottoman empire (now Istanbul, Turkey), as the allies approach the city during World War One. Tracking shot on the water (Bosporus straits), moving to left. We pass many old buildings, Hagia Sophia, as well as other churches and mosques with domes, minarets, etc. Low […]
New Economic Pogrom: Israeli squatters uproot 5000 olive tree saplings In Palestinian West Bank
BETHLEHEM (Ma’an) — Jewish settlers have uprooted more than 5,000 olive tree saplings in agricultural lands east of the town of Turmusayya in the central West Bank north of Ramallah, locals said Thursday. One of the owners of the lands targeted, Awad Abu Samra, told Ma’an that in the last week settlers have repeatedly raided […]
President Obama’s Biggest Mideast Policy Challenges, 2015
By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) — Barack Obama wanted to be the president who got the US out of Afghanistan and Iraq, and turned America’s diplomatic energies to the more promising Pacific Rim. 2014 was the year in which he failed decisively at these objectives. He has had to keep 10,000 US military personnel […]
U.S. Twists Arms to Help Defeat Resolution on Palestine
By Thalif Deen UNITED NATIONS (IPS) – The United States re-asserted its political and economic clout – and its ability to twist arms and perhaps metaphorically break kneecaps – when it successfully lobbied to help defeat a crucial Security Council resolution on the future of Palestine this week. Nadia Hijab, executive director of Al-Shabaka: The […]
New “Sustainable City” in Dubai aims to be Net Carbon Zero
Dubai City | — “The goal of sustainability is to enhance quality of life, without compromising the needs of future generations. Sustainability is achieved by balancing the social economic and environmental needs of humans with the environment. We shall adopt sustainability in our day to day lives, in our thinking, and in all aspects of […]