Bangkok Could Prove Crucial To Avert Global Warming
By Taro Ichikawa IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis BANGKOK (IDN) - One would think that the triple disaster in Japan, unleashed by the 9 magnitude earthquake, and unprecedented flooding and mudslides in the south of Thailand would motivate government officials from around the world to agree on concrete and binding steps to halt global warming that would endanger all life on planet Earth.

Gaddafi Challenged To Impose Genuine Ceasefire
By Ernest Corea IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis WASHINGTON D.C. (IDN) - Egypt's President Anwar el Sadat once said that President Muammar el Gaddafi was a "strange person" and later called him a "mad man". Asked for his reaction to Sadat's scathing assertion, Gaddafi tersely replied: "Sadat is not a doctor." In recent weeks, American academics, bureaucrats, journalists, and politicians have given readers and audiences pseudo-psychological assessments of Gaddafi that are not unlike Sadat's non-medical diagnosis.

UN Launches Concerted Bid to Assist Japan
By Jaya Ramachandran IDN-InDepth NewsReport GENEVA (IDN) - As Japan battles to stave off a nuclear catastrophe, the United Nations has launched a concerted bid to help the East Asian country to cope with the multi-front disaster that Prime Minister Naoto Kan has called Japan's worst since World War II sixty-five years ago. As a result of the March 11 devastating earthquake, tsunami and atomic power plant breakdown, over 5,000 people have died, nearly 9,000 others . . .

Has The Security Council Become a Military Junta?
By Baher Kamal* IDN-InDepth NewsViewpoint MADRID (IDN) - It's amazing, just amazing, this international system! It presumably has a world Parliament made of delegates from all countries on Earth and called the General Assembly of the United Nations. Such a Parliament is led by a mini executive body of only five countries, called the Security and Peace Council.

Cote d’Ivoire Situation Has Become a Real Gordian Knot
By Eva Weiler IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis GENEVA (IDN) – Amidst rising concern about a seriously deteriorating human rights and humanitarian situation in Cote d'Ivoire that a UN expert body perceives as a threat to international peace and security and an international think-tank says is dragging the strife-torn country to the verge of a civil war, a former Ghana president has faulted the international community's behaviour.

New Vienna Organisation to Spur Disarmament
By Jamshed Baruah IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis BERLIN/VIENNA (IDN) - The Vienna Center for Disarmament and Non-Proliferation is a new feather in the cap for Austria, which served as a bridge between East and West under the leadership of Chancellor Bruno Kreisky in the 1970s, and was the venue of some early rounds of the Strategic Arms Reduction Talks (START) between the United States and the now defunct Soviet Union.

‘Make Access to Energy a Right of All Citizens’
By Richard Johnson IDN-InDepth NewsReport PARIS (IDN) - The 28-nation International Energy Agency (IEA), linked with the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development -- also known as the ‘rich man’s club’ -- is calling for urgent action to secure adequate funds so that universal energy access becomes a reality.

UN Implores Japan for a Big Climate Step in Durban
By Hiroshi Nagai* IDN-InDepth NewsReport TOKYO (IDN) - The top climate change official of the United Nations, Christiana Figueres, has implored governments to swiftly transform the Cancun agreements into substantial action on the ground, and in particular urged Japan to provide clarity on the future of the Kyoto Protocol. The Kyoto Protocol, adopted in Kyoto, Japan, on December 11, 1997, is an international agreement linked to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC).

‘Abolish Nukes in the Middle East and Beyond’
By Jamshed Baruah IDN-InDepth NewsReport BERLIN/TOKYO (IDN) - As ‘people power’ topples one Arab regime after another, confronting the international community with an unprecedented volatile situation, an eminent Buddhist leader is urging the world's major powers not to lose sight of the compelling need to bring about a nuclear-weapons-free Middle East as one of the crucial steps towards nuclear abolition. Complete elimination of all atomic weapons -- and not just nuclear disarmament -- with the civil society playing a significant role . . .

‘To The Hungry, God Is Bread’
By Ernest Corea IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis WASHINGTON D.C. (IDN) - Finance Ministers and Central Bankers of the Group of 20 (G20) -- the world's top economic performers -- who met on February 18-19 in Paris, took a low-keyed approach to a potential world food crisis that was the subject of much analysis and agitated comment on the eve of the meeting.

A Little Known UN Declaration Observes 25th Anniversary
By IDN Development Desk IDN-InDepth NewsReport BERLIN (IDN) - Though hardly known beyond a circle of experts, the right to development is a human right enshrined in a United Nations declaration. As the world body starts commemorating the 25th anniversary of the Declaration, UN High Commissioner Navi Pillay has expressed the hope that it would draw wider public attention, particularly in the wake of popular uprisings in North Africa and the Gulf region.

Indigenous Peoples Have a New Forum Now
By Stefano Colombo IDN-InDepth NewsReport ROME (IDN) - Indigenous peoples comprise one-third of the world's one billion extreme poor in rural areas. They are among the most vulnerable and marginalized of any group. Spread over 70 countries and representing diverse cultural backgrounds, they share many concerns such as limited access to healthcare and education, loss of control over lands, displacement and violations of basic human rights.

UN Far From Timid in Condemning Arab Leaders
By Jaya Ramachandran IDN-InDepth NewsReport GENEVA (IDN) - The youth uprisings in North Africa and the Middle East have caught not only the governments in major European countries and the U.S. unawares but also the United Nations. And yet the reactions from within the UN -- essentially an intergovernmental organisation -- have been far from timid.

Security Council Discovers Linkages between Poverty and Peace
By J Chandler IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis TORONTO (IDN) - Better late than never: Following this axiom, the UN Security Council which normally debates country-specific and war-and-peace issues such as Sudan and the Middle East, decided to widen its horizon and discussed in a high-level session some of the root causes underlying conflicts around the world.

UN Keen to Reinforce Disaster Reduction Strategies
By Richard Johnson IDN-InDepth NewsReport GENEVA (IDN) - Poverty, rapid urbanization and the impact of climate change resulted in 950 disasters in 2010, making it one of the deadliest years in more than a generation.

African Democracy Alien to Ban Ki-moon
By Okello Oculi * IDN-InDepth NewsViewpoint ** ABUJA (IDN) - The United Nations secretary general Mr Ban Ki-moon is a strange type of democrat. Speaking to the press at Addis Ababa outside the meeting of the African Union he spoke thus: "I am concerned that differences of opinion are now surfacing among the African Union. This is not desirable at this time in preserving the integrity and fundamental principle of democracy." His notion of democracy does not value "differences of opinion". It stands at variance to Mwalimu Nyerere's view of the workings of . . .

Beyond the Illusion of UN Security Council Reform
By Ramesh Jaura IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis BERLIN (IDN) - Some nine months after President Barack Obama backed India for a permanent seat on the UN Security Council, he may spring a surprise at the General Assembly opening session in September 2011 that would initiate a process paving the way for the promise becoming a reality.

UN Disarmament Forum Embroiled in a Battle of Attrition
By Jaya Ramachandran IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis GENEVA (IDN) - The stalemate plaguing the United Nations Conference on Disarmament for the last two years is so perturbing that the UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has felt constrained to express his disappointment, carefully avoiding any reference to the diplomatic cut-and-thrust between Pakistan and India.
 

‘Don’t Abandon Somalia’
By Jerome Mwanda IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis NAIROBI (IDN) - Twenty years after the Somalia President Mohamed Siad Barre was ousted on January 26, 1991, the country in the Horn of Africa remains embroiled in an endless cycle of civil war, religious conflict and clan violence, and has come to be known as a failed state.

Persisting Deadlock in Israeli-Palestine Talks Worries UN
By J. Chandler IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis TORONTO (IDN) - As the Middle East Quartet prepares to meet on February 5 in the southern German city of Munich to end the agonising deadlock in Israeli-Palestine peace talks, a high-ranking United Nations official has expressed "extreme concern" about the precarious situation in the tension-ridden and war-torn region.
 

Combating Poverty with Clean Energy
By Bernhard Schell IDN-InDepth NewsReport ABU DHABI (IDN) - Fighting poverty by promoting sustainable development and mitigating climate change is one of the priorities of UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon for 2011. With this is view, he is calling for a global revolution that would benefit some 1.6 billion people in developing countries still lacking access to electricity.

Time Running Out for African Union Mission in Somalia
By Brenda Sorensen IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis STOCKHOLM (IDN) - In spite of the declared support by the United States, the African Union Mission in Somalia (AMISOM) has since its deployment to Mogadishu in March 2007 failed to bring peace and stability to the failed state, but time is running out to find an alternative, says a new study.

The Case Against Military Intervention in Cote d'Ivoire
By Mawuli Dake* IDN-InDepth NewsViewpoint** WASHINGTON DC (IDN) - As the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), France, the African Union (AU) and the United Nations (UN) continue to beat war drums over Cote d'Ivoire, they are pushing the country on a treacherous path to a precipice of war.

//UPDATED//Considerable Progress Towards a Nuclear Test-Ban Treaty
By Jaya Ramachandran IDN-InDepth NewsReport VIENNA (IDN) - An international pact outlawing all atomic explosions for military or civilian purposes is not yet around the corner but there is reason to rejoice at considerable advances made towards entry into force of a comprehensive nuclear test-ban treaty. The first decade of the 21st century has witnessed some "remarkable achievements" driven by "a vision to bring an end to the era of nuclear weapons," says Tibor Tóth, Executive Secretary of the Preparatory Commission for the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organization (CTBTO).
 

Flood Victims in Pakistan in Dire Need of Aid
By Bernhard Schell IDN-InDepthNewsAnalysis KARACHI (IDN) - As the Gregorian calendar's New Year ushered in, millions of people in Pakistan -- mostly poor -- continued to be in need of assistance. However, only 51 percent of the $2 billion U.S. dollar appeal to aid flood victims had been funded.

Health Spending in Asia Increases
By Jaya Ramachandran IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis PARIS (IDN) - "Every human being is the author of his own health or disease." This quote from Prince Gautama Siddhartha, the founder of Buddhism, should in the modern-day world be taken to read "Every State is the author of its citizens' health or disease."

China Asked to Address Needs of Smallholders and Nomads
By Hiroshi Nagai and Taro Ichikawa IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis TOKYO (IDN) - A new report has urged the Chinese authorities to pay heed to the needs of smallholders, who are crucial to food security, and devote attention to herding communities that put a halt to the degradation of pasture lands and preserve biodiversity.

Progress Goes Hand in Hand with Challenges for China
By Hiroshi Nagai and Taro Ichikawa IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis TOKYO (IDN) - China's great economic and social progress has lifted several hundred million people out of poverty and succeeding in feeding one-fifth of the entire world population. Nevertheless, the most populous nation on planet Earth is faced with some veritable challenges.
 

Austerity Budgets Will Cause Further Child Poverty
By Richard Johnson IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis STRASBOURG (IDN) – Austerity budgets threaten to aggravate child poverty that is already plaguing large numbers of children among the poor, says the Council of Europe Commissioner for Human Rights, Thomas Hammarberg, in his latest Human Rights Comment.
 

TB Poses Grave Challenge – Not Only – to Africa
By Jerome Mwanda IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis GENEVA (IDN) - Five million lives can be saved between now and 2015 by fully funding and implementing the Global Plan to Stop TB, says the World Health Organization (WHO), drawing the focus on a contagious disease of poverty that affects mainly young adults in their most productive years.

Nuclear Disarmament Has a Future
By Jamshed Baruah IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis BERLIN (IDN) - The United Nations is keen to counter growing skepticism about nuclear disarmament really happening and culminating into a nuke free world. According to the UN High Representative for Disarmament Affairs, Sergio Duarte, the peoples and countries of the world are not willing to hang on to nuclear weapons and put at risk all that has been accomplished in building international interdependence.
 

Light Mingles with Shadows in Latin America and the Caribbean
By J Chandler IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis TORONTO (IDN) - A mix of light and shadows pervades Latin America and the Caribbean as respectable economic growth in spite the global financial crisis mingles with the damage caused by climate change -- and the prospects are far from encouraging. The UN Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) expects the region to grow by 6 percent in 2010, following a 1.9 percent decline in 2009, thanks to the economic recovery in most countries in the region.

Cancun Has Good News for the United Nations
By Maria Luisa Vargas IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis MEXICO CITY (IDN) - The agreements achieved at the climate change conference in Cancun underline that that the United Nations' decision to refrain from setting a high expectation bar ahead of the international gathering was most appropriate. Of critical importance is also that it has reinstated faith in multilateral processes under the umbrella of the United Nations.
 

Globalization in the Reverse Gear
By Roberto Savio* IDN-InDepth NewsViewpoint ROME (IDN) - Citizens all over the world are now being confronted with a series of hammering news releases by WikiLeaks' revelations on how U.S. diplomats see the world and how the financial capital speculates about the weaknesses of states from Italy to Germany. While developed countries have been carrying out massive cuts to their national budgets with sweeping layoffs, governments of the world had declared -- even before COP 16 ended -- that not much will be accomplished at the climate change meeting in Cancun, Mexico.

Europe Wants Social Protection for the Poor in Africa
By Jaya Ramachandran IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis BRUSSELS (IDN) - European institutions dealing with international development have realized that poverty cannot be eradicated by concessional loans, technical aid, grants or budget aid alone. Something more is required: social protection for the poor.

Three Imperatives of a Climate Accord
By Martin Khor* IDN-InDepth NewsViewpoint GENEVA (IDN) - In the quest for an international climate agreement on actions to address the climate change crisis, three aspects have to be the basis simultaneously: the environmental imperative, the developmental imperative, and the equity imperative. This EDE formula requires that the different pieces of the climate negotiations be seen and addressed as a whole, in a holistic way.

Lebanon in a Quandary
By Jaya Ramachandran IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis BRUSSELS (IDN) - As the UN-backed Special Tribunal for Lebanon (STL), dealing with the assassination of former Prime Minister Rafic Hariri in 2005, prepares to issue its first indictments, a prestigious think-tank is pleading for an intra-Lebanese deal, which it considers necessary to avoid a breakdown of the country's precarious balance of power.

Developing Nations Alone Cannot Drive Global Recovery
By Richard Johnson IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis GENEVA (IDN) - Developing countries continue to drive the global recovery but are not in a position to make up for slowdown in the advanced countries. Consequently, 2011 does not hold out much hope for the world economy, says a new report by the United Nations.

Wary Coexistence in a Nuclear Neighbourhood
By Ernest Corea IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis WASHINGTON DC (IDN) - Anxiety that tensions in and around the Yellow Sea could develop in fairly short order into another Korean War has quietly receded, even temporarily, as public interest has moved towards the explosion of cable traffic (between the State Department and American embassies) across the pages of the world's newspapers.

Cancun Conference is also about Poverty Eradication
By Ramesh Jaura IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis BERLIN (IDN) - The United Nations is refraining from setting a high expectation bar when it points out that the Cancun climate change conference is "not intended to establish the ultimate framework for comprehensive global action". This is the plain message the secretariat of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in Bonn is conveying to the media.

Canada's Endorsement of Indigenous Rights Significant
By J Chandler IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis TORONTO (IDN) - Canada's endorsement of the global treaty outlining the rights of the world's estimated 370 million indigenous peoples has been welcomed by the head of a United Nations body dealing with the issue.

Little Social Security for Most People in the World
By Richard Johnson IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis GENEVA (IDN) - Though basic social security is critical for mitigating the dire consequences of economic crises, it remains out of reach for most people across the world, above all in poorer countries, finds a new United Nations report.

Nobel Laureates Plead for International Law to Abolish Nukes
By Ramesh Jaura IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis BERLIN (IDN) – The Nobel Peace Laureates' call on China, the United States, Egypt, Iran, Israel and Indonesia to ratify the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT) without delay could not have emerged from a more appropriate venue and come at a more apt point in time.

G20 Urged to Walk the Talk at Seoul Summit
By Taro Ichikawa IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis BANGKOK (IDN) - Civil society and anti-corruption action groups have welcomed the Anti-Corruption Action Plan agreed at the Group of 20 (G20) Seoul Summit of world's major economies. While it represents a significant advance in the global fight against bribery, they say, it remains to be seen whether the G20 governments will really walk the talk.

Promises Betrayed Cause Suffering in Haiti
By Ashley Smith* IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis BURLINGTON, USA (IDN) - Ten months after the earthquake that killed 300,000 people and drove 2 million people into temporary camps, Haiti is a country betrayed, occupied and oppressed. The U.S. and other powerful nations, along with the UN and non-governmental organizations (NGOs), pledged money and resources to aid . . .

'Women Weaving Bougainville Together'
By Neena Bhandari* IDN-InDepth NewsFeature SYDNEY (IDN/VISIONEWS) - Helen Samu Hakena exudes a serenity that belies her extraordinary energy and inner strength that she has devoted to the cause of justice, peace building and advocating for women's and human rights and the United Nations Security Council Resolution 1325. Recognising her expertise in advancing the role and interests of women in peace and security processes, Helen was nominated . . .

Stoking an Asian Cold War?
By Jayantha Dhanapala* IDN-InDepth NewsViewpoint WASHINGTON (IDN) - Proxy wars between countries was one of the more tragic features of the Cold War between the U.S. and the USSR. Both super-powers fuelled the conflicts supplying military materiel and political support while they piously claimed that nuclear deterrence worked so that they themselves never went to war. The U.S. in particular claimed that the George Kennan doctrine of the "containment" of the USSR worked and ere long the Communist giant imploded obligingly.

World Closer To Enforcing Treaty Outlawing Nuclear Explosions
Interview of Tibor Tóth, CTBTO Executive Secretary IDN-InDepth NewsSpecial BERLIN/VIENNA (IDN) - Almost 190 countries around the world have reaffirmed the critical importance of enforcing the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT) adopted by the United Nations General Assembly in 1996. The treaty outlaws all atomic explosions in all environments, for military or civilian purpose. Though the CTBT has yet to enter into force, it has been ratified by 153 countries and enjoys almost universal membership of 182 signatory states. "Bringing the Treaty into force is the obvious and logical next step to take and with adequate political leadership such a step is virtually around the corner," says Ambassador Tibor Tóth of Hungary . . .

Women Essential for Sustainable Peace
By Ambassador Anwarul K. Chowdhury* IDN-InDepth NewsViewpoint NEW YORK (IDN) - The International Women's Day in 2000 was an extraordinary day for me and will remain so for the rest of my life. That day, I had the honour, on behalf of the United Nations Security Council as its President, of issuing a statement that formally brought to global attention the unrecognized, under-utilized and under-valued contribution women have been making to preventing war, to building peace and to engaging individuals and societies live in harmony.

Biodiversity Conference Gives Cause for Rejoicing
By Hiroshi Nagai* IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis TOKYO (IDN) - "If Kyoto entered history as the city where the climate accord was born, Nagoya will be remembered as the city where the biodiversity accord was born," said Ahmed Djoghlaf, Executive Secretary of the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD). He was commenting the tenth Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity (COP-10) that concluded October 29 in Nagoya, Japan.

G-20 Urged to Push for Eradicating Corruption
By Jaya Ramachandran IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis BERLIN (IDN) - While releasing the 2010 'Corruption Perceptions Index', Transparency International has lauded the Group of 20 (G-20) for recognising corruption as "a global problem that must be addressed in global policy reforms". "It is commendable that the Group of 20 in pursuing financial reform has made strong commitments to transparency and integrity ahead of their November summit in Seoul," said Huguette Labelle, Chair of Transparency International (TI). "But the process of reform itself must be accelerated," she added.

Emerging Economies Face Alarming Situation
By IDN Environment Desk IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis BERLIN (IDN) - Some of the world's largest and fastest-growing economies, including India, are faced with an alarming situation. Their populations, ecosystems and business environments are faced with the greatest risks over the next 30 years, according to a new global ranking, which calculates the vulnerability of 170 countries to the impacts of climate change.

Not All Roads Lead Everyone to the UN Security Council
By Suresh Jaura IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis TORONTO (IDN) – While India is relishing its success in having made it to the United Nations Security Council, official Canada is licking its wounds after being defeated in a passionate bid to rub shoulders with the powerful and the emerging.

Nagoya Offers a New Opportunity For Biodiversity
By Taro Ichikawa IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis TOKYO (IDN) - The gathering is global and unprecedented in numbers. Its medium-term objective is ambitious. Its vision extends to the middle of the century. If all goes well, negotiators from around the world meeting in Nagoya until October 29 will agree on a new biodiversity strategy worth trillions of dollars. Such a strategy is essential because land and marine ecosystems around the world are under intense pressure from human activities.

Addressing the Overcomplexity of International Aid Architecture
By Eckhard Deutscher and Pierre Jacquet* IDN-InDepth NewsSpecial PARIS (IDN) - Since the early 2000s, development issues have come to the fore in international forums, public discussions and G8 summits. Hardly any declaration by any world leader has ignored them. Speeches and typically undelivered promises have been made, civil society organizations have mobilized behind such objectives as poverty reduction or improving health conditions. The private sector has also increasingly been considered as a major actor and contributed through various initiatives and public-private partnerships to addressing some of the related challenges.

UN Launches Decade for Combating Desertification in Asia
By Hiroshi Nagai and Taro Ichikawa IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis TOKYO (IDN) – In run-up to the UN conference on biological diversity in Nagoya, the United Nations has launched the Decade for Deserts and the Fight against Desertification for the Asian region where close to 40 percent of the land area is affected by drought and land degradation. This is also the region with the largest population suffering from the impacts of desertification.

Tianjin Sends Out Signals of Climate Hope and Scepticism
By Hiroshi Nagai and Taro Ichikawa IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis TOKYO (IDN) - Though the outcome of the UN Climate Change Conference in China is far from satisfying, there are glimmers of hope for the year-end global gathering in Cancun, according to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) secretariat, Friends of the Earth International and Oxfam. But there is also lingering scepticism.

UN Hosts Nuke Abolition Exhibition in Vienna
By Ramesh Jaura IDN-InDepth NewsReport VIENNA (IDN) - "Since wars begin in the minds of men, it is in the minds of men that the defences of peace must be constructed." These words from the preamble of UNESCO's Constitution, inscribed on an exhibition panel, have caught the attention of Ana María Cetto as she walks around the exposition. This is "one of the most evocative . . . phrases of any UN constitution," declares Cetto, opening the exhibition at the UN headquarters in Vienna. Cetto is the deputy director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), set up as the 'Atoms for Peace' organization in 1957.

Development Rhetoric sans Much Substance
By J. R. Ishwaran IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis NEW YORK (IDN) - Rhetoric rather than substance characterizes the outcome document of the UN Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) Summit. Insights and some forward-looking manifested in the speeches of world leaders for reinvigorating development partnership so as to achieve the desired results by 2015 was conspicuous by its absence, according to analysts. Some of the solutions put on the table, such as the resounding call for the adoption of a Financial Transaction Tax (FTT) led by France and repeated by Belgium were welcome.

No Magic Bullet to Tackle Climate Change
By Jutta Wolf IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis BERLIN (IDN) - UN's topmost climate official Christiana Figueres has indicated that she is not expecting a single climate agreement that will act as a magic bullet and solve everything straightaway. But she hopes that governments will agree on "a new development paradigm that harnesses the full power of society, science and business". Figueres, who is Executive Secretary of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), made these remarks in run-up to the penultimate round of negotiations in China . . .

Harvest of Words Cannot Feed the Hungry
By Ernest Corea IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis WASHINGTON DC (IDN) - The harvest of words that was strewn around the UN's recently concluded Millennium Development Goals (MDG) Summit has by now been spread across the world. In fact, a significant by-product of the Summit was that it created public awareness about the extent of poverty in the world.

UN Pleads for Curbing Speculation in Food Commodities
By IDN Global Economy Desk IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis BERLIN (IDN) - The UN Special Rapporteur on the right to food has criticised the European Union (EU) for not acting as boldly as the U.S. and striving to keep in check speculation in food commodities that led to the 2008 global food price crisis, which affects many developing countries to this day. An unmistakable sign of 'no lessons leant' is the fact that London continues to be the world's largest agricultural commodities market outside the United States.

UN Proposes Rescue Package to Halt Loss of Biodiversity
By Richard Johnson IDN-InDepth News Analysis GENEVA (IDN) - Ecosystems -- and the biodiversity that underpins them -- support livelihoods around the world and generate services worth between $21 trillion and up to $72 trillion a year. This is comparable to World Gross National Income in 2008 of $58 trillion, according to the UN Environment Programme (UNEP).

Decent Work Crucial For Development
By Jaya Ramachandran IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis BRUSSELS (IDN) - Decent work can serve as a catalyst to achieve the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), according to a new report, which comes at the mid-way point of a United Nations gathering of heads of government and state in New York, convened to review progress made in the past ten years to alleviate poverty.

Japan-Africa Meet Pledges to Combat Biodiversity Loss
By Hiroshi Nagai* IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis TOKYO (IDN) - Japan has called for a more robust global approach to tackle the world’s deteriorating biodiversity crisis, pledged to strengthen its assistance to the continent and outlined key strategies to meet the challenge.

UN Report Slams Israel for Fragmenting Palestine
By Bernhard Schell IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis AMMAN (IDN) – A new United Nations report has cautiously criticized Israel for undermining the prospects of a two-State resolution of the conflict by "breeding not only economic disparities but also social and political polarization" in Palestine. "Fragmentation and lack of contiguity within the West Bank -- including East Jerusalem -- and between the West Bank and Gaza Strip not only undermine . . .

Greener Water Laws Will Save Lives and Environment
By Brenda Sorensen IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis STOCKHOLM (IDN) - The lack of safe drinking water and basic sanitation is killing year in and year out 1.8 million children under the age of five. They die from diarrheal diseases such as cholera, typhoid, and dysentery. In fact, a new report warns that if the international community fails to take action to improve freshwater supplies for drinking, sanitation, and hygiene purposes, as many as 135 million preventable deaths could occur by 2020.

Kenya Takes the Lead in East Africa to handle e-Waste
By Jerome Mwanda IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis NAIROBI (IDN) - Kenya is expected become the first country in East Africa to develop regulations on the management of electronic waste (e-waste), with a view to minimizing the impacts of the unsafe disposal of electronic products on public health and the environment.

The Long Road from Retail Chain to Global Environment
By Taro Ichikawa IDN-InDepth NewsFeature* TOKYO (IDN) - They are engaged in greening activities at home and abroad: tree planting in the Great Wall area in China, around the Quindao Lao Mountain Dam, in south Thailand, on the outskirts of Kuala Lumpur, in areas around the World Heritage Site of Angkor Wat, and in Kenya.

Moving to a Safer World with a Million Pleas Campaign
By Neena Bhandari IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis SYDNEY (IDN) – As the threat of nuclear annihilation becomes more real than ever before, the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN) Australia has launched a 'Million Pleas' campaign, emphasising the urgency to rid the world of these weapons.

UNDP Preparing Recovery Plans for Pakistan
By Bernhard Schell IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis ISLAMABAD (IDN) - Floods triggered by unprecedented rains have resulted in a relatively low loss of life, killing 1,600 people out of the 17.2 million affected by the floods, according to the Government of Pakistan. But the homes and livelihoods of millions of Pakistanis have been obliterated.

Environment Group Fumes at UN Report on Nigeria Oil Spills
By IDN Environment Desk IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis (IDN) - Friends of the Earth International (FoEI) says that it is "outraged" by reports that a major United Nations investigation into Nigeria oil spills, funded by oil giant Shell, relies more on figures produced by oil companies and Nigerian state statistics than on community testimony and organizations on the ground who work with communities.

Guarding Environment with a Paper-and-Pencil Project
By Taro Ichikawa IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis* BANGKOK (IDN) - Asia-Pacific already has the largest number of motorized vehicles in the world and if the present trend continues, the region would in the coming years have more automobiles than Europe and North America combined. In Japan alone, the number of vehicles has swelled from 8.12 million in 1966 to 78 million in 2009. Of these 54 percent are passenger vehicles, 34 percent light-duty vehicles, and 8 percent trucks. The rest are motorcycles and buses.

Asia Expects a New Decade in Sustainable Transport
By Taro Ichikawa IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis BANGKOK (IDN) - A new town of about 150,000 people is expected to sprout every day in the next 20 years in the Asia-Pacific region, increasing the urban population from 1.6 billion to 2.7 billion in 2030. This will also influence mobility patterns and private vehicle usage.

Child Labour Flourishing in Fast Growing Economies
By Eleonore Meyer IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis BERLIN (IDN) - Nearly 160 million kids aged between five and fourteen are trapped in child labour world wide. They are everywhere but invisible, toiling as domestic servants in homes, labouring behind the walls of workshops, hidden from view in plantations, handling chemicals and pesticides in agriculture, working in mines, or operating dangerous machinery.