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Although its record of reserve-based biodiversity conservation is striking, Beijing’s approach to the conservation of living natural resources outside reserves is less impressive. Pressures for economic development often eclipse complex ecological and cultural factors. This is especially true on (…)

We, the undersigned organizations and individuals, mark the August 31st partial withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq with the following evaluation and recommendations: The U.S. occupation of Iraq continues and the reduction of U.S. troops in Iraq can at best be called only a rebranded occupation. (…)

October 2010 marks the fifth anniversary of the Right to Information (RTI) Act. The Act and its implementation have been described in both administrative circles and civil society as “revolutionary” , “a blow for transparency”, “a check on corrupt practices” and “a people’s intervention tool (…)

The supreme judiciary in Bangladesh has made it clear that martial law has no place in a civilised country that has a Constitution. After the recent landmark verdict of the appellate division of the Supreme Court that nullified the 5th Amendment to the Constitution and thus declared the military (…)

Floods in the Indus, triggered by the heavy monsoon rain, devastate vast swathes of land and render millions homeless in Pakistan. Moving at a furious pace from the mountainous north-western region of Gilgit-Baltistan to the fertile south, the Indus river, swollen and bursting its banks (…)

The tenacity, the wisdom and the courage of those who have been fighting for years, for decades, to bring change, or even the whisper of justice to their lives, is something extraordinary. Whether people are fighting to overthrow the Indian State, or fighting against Big Dams, or only fighting a (…)

The recent announcement by President Zuma that certain traditional leadership positions would be not be continued when the incumbent leaders died was met by a remarkable lack of reaction and discussion in the media. Against the bigger picture this was a cosmetic change to traditional and (…)

A new study by Pesticide Action Network International (PAN) documents that hazardous pesticides are commonly used in unsafe situations around the world, and calls for assertive action by corporations, governments and international bodies to address pesticide hazards. The report release coincided (…)

Popular Media, Democracy and Development in Africa examines the role that popular media could play to encourage political debate, provide information for development, or critique the very definitions of ‘democracy’ and ‘development’. Drawing on diverse case studies from various regions of the (…)

Xenophobia is not contained to Europe’s extremist fringes but part of the political mainstream, writes the Forum of Concerned Citizens of Europe in an open letter to Europe’s leaders. Quick-fix political solutions appealing to a mythical Europe of homogenous communities must be replaced by a (…)

Access to cheap energy made us rich, wrecked our climate and left us lonely, explains Bill McKibben. Read more

May has seen an upsurge in local organizations exercising their human rights to housing. Most people recognize that international human rights guarantee all humans a right to housing. With the millions of homeless living in our communities and the millions of empty foreclosed houses all across (…)

The Bhopal mega-crime trial is over. The barbarity has ended in a light sentence, although the victims are countless. Eight officials of the erstwhile Union Carbide India Limited have been convicted and sentenced to two years’ rigorous imprisonment. There is still no bar on trying the corporate (…)

In a State where more than two-thirds of rural families live below the poverty line and other social indicators are as dismal, the process of industrialisation that began at the turn of the century ought to have been a cause for optimism. But, of late, people have been fighting tooth and nail (…)

The political topography of Sri Lanka has changed beyond recognition since the military defeat of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) and the death of its leader, Velupillai Prabakaran, in May last year. Contrary to the apprehensions in several quarters, there are no apparent signs of a (…)

Right from the time of Independence, Pakistan has been troubled. The country’s psyche has been scarred since it emerged from the turmoil and bloodletting of Partition. Further trauma was in store when, in 1971, the eastern wing broke away, calling into question the very basis – ostensibly, (…)

Zimbabwe is currently the subject of sanctions designed to pressure Robert Mugabe and his colleagues to cease human rights abuses and remove other barriers to democratization in the country. Yet despite some recent positive developments — such as the appointment of independent commissions on (…)

The diverse social insurgencies in such countries as Thailand, Greece, India and China can also be seen in a common frame, as responses to a global process that produces extreme inequality and exclusion. Read more

Nearly a week after the event, Thailand is still stunned by the military assault on the Red Shirt encampment in the tourist center of the capital city of Bangkok on May 19. The Thai government is treating captured Red Shirt leaders and militants like they’re from an occupied country. No doubt (…)

Over the centuries, the poison of caste has been variously sung about, lamented, protested, outlawed and adjudicated in this region. During that time, the economic and cultural foundations of – and, most of all, the religious sanction for – this abhorrent practice have all been sculpted to (…)