Inter Press Service

By Ira Helfand Soon after President Barack Obama was elected in 2008, hundreds of leaders of the global medical community wrote an open letter to him, and to newly elected Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, urging them to make the abolition…

By Francesca Dziadek With a persistent undercurrent of discrimination against foreigners, ‘Gastarbeiter’ (guest workers) and citizens of colour, despite the fact that 20 percent of its population – roughly 16 million residents – are from an immigrant background, Germany is faced with the…

The United Nations climate talks in Doha went a full extra 24 hours and ended without increased cuts in fossil fuel emissions and without financial commitments between 2013 and 2015. “This an incredibly weak deal,” said Samantha Smith representing the…

By Daniela Pastrana Each scarf represents a life cut short. Each stitch, a tear. Each thread, a cry of frustration about death and impunity.The Mexican hands embroidering for peace belong to mothers searching for missing sons and daughters, people demanding…

By Marcela Valente A wide-ranging reform of Argentina’s civil code is looking to replace traditional concepts of parental authority and control with one of parental responsibility, while expressly prohibiting corporal punishment for children and adolescents. “The changes are pursuing a…

By Mel Frykberg The ceasefire has brought extremities in Gaza. In the morning the coastal territory woke up bashed and bloody from one of Israel’s most intensive nights of bombardment since a week’s tit for tat violence broke out between…

By Fabiana Frayssinet A Nigerian diviner dances and sings next to a Brazilian priest of the Candomblé religion, brought to this South American country by African slaves, that is now being rescued from oblivion in school texts on national history…

By AJ Correspondents State media report that Xi Jinping is to take the reins of China’s all-powerful Communist Party in a leadership transition that will put him in charge of the world’s number-two economy for the next decade. Xi, the…

By Apostolis Fotiadis Ignoring the thousands of protestors gathered outside the Greek parliament on Wednesday, the government voted in public spending cuts amounting to 17 billion dollars in an economy already on its knees from a lacerated budget. The government…

Last month experts published a series of studies indicating that, contrary to previous conclusions, the animal populations are decreasing in the exclusion zone which surrounds the site where the former Soviet nuclear plant functioned, and that the effects of the radioactive contamination following the explosion have been “overwhelming”.