Opinions

Luc Gnacadja has rock-solid reason to be upbeat: some 100 heads of state agreed at the Rio+20 – to strive for “a land-degradation neutral world”, characterised by zero growth in desertification.
In doing so they were responding to the UNCCD’s clarion call in a “policy brief” for ‘A Sustainable Development Goal for Rio+20: Zero Net Land Degradation’.

More than 140 countries have passed counterterrorism laws since the attacks of September 11, 2001, often with little regard for due process and other basic rights, Human Rights Watch said in a new report.
The 112-page report, “In the Name of Security: Counterterrorism Laws Worldwide since September 11,” says that while terrorist attacks have caused thousands (read more)…

We are seeing increasing social protests all over the world, with hundreds of thousands on the streets from Santiago to Montreal, from Moscow to Tokyo and everywhere in between. Sudan, after having recently divorced its southern neighbour is a country not know for its human rights and police leniency, so it is encouraging that even here things are moving, even if carefully.

Friends of the Humanist Movement and Silo’s message took a bus from Argentina’s Buenos Aires to Jujuy to accompany the Tupac Amaru in their celebrations of Inti Raymi. They joined together to absorb the force and energy of the winter solstice solar rays, of Tata Inti – Father Sun, while giving thanks for all the good that had happened while discarding all the bad.

The final document of the Summit of the peoples summarizes the main points discussed during plenary sessions and meetings, as well as express the intense mobilization that occurred during this period that point of convergence around the structural causes and false solutions, solutions to the crises facing the people, as well as the main axes of struggle for the next period.

Unlike India, China has by and large steered clear of day-to-day politics in Nepal, focussing on trade and investment. Looking to expand its role after the 2008 Tibetan protests in Kathmandu got out of hand, Beijing has started a massive investment drive. building hydropower microgrids for free, investing $1.8 billion in a 750 MW hydro project (continued below)

Revolution, Uprising, Protest Movement, Crisis, Armed Insurgency, Civil War, and many other variations of titles have been used over the past 15 months to describe events in Syria. There have been many disagreements on Syria over this span of time, but there is no disagreement over the fact that Syria has been the central event on the global political scene.

At the Global Media Forum, organised by Deutsche Welle and currently underway in Bonn, Germany, Pressenza director, Pia Figueroa was invited to participate on a panel on the theme of sustainability education. “We are convinced that until development is from all and for all human beings, violent conditions that put at risk social as well as personal life will persist.”

Our manifesto offers Humanist Party candidates and activists a useful and adaptable platform that challenges the status quo where-ever, bringing into play a Greening and a Humanizing relevant today. Our proposals are are alternatives to what those of the old mentality propose, with their vague and empty promises as they shuffle for prestigious, high paid jobs.

Short of passionately pleading for a profound change in the military-oriented mind-sets of decision-makers, SIPRI Director has called for a “far greater focus on less militarized solutions” to the global security challenges ahead, and for “an innovative integration of preventive diplomacy, pre-emptive and early-warning technologies, and cooperative transnational partnerships.”