International issues

They now total 700 million people. By 2050 they will be about two billion or over 20 per cent of the world’s population. Many of them are still vibrant and essential contributors to the development and stability. Yet, they are largely excluded from the wider global and national development agendas.They are the elderly–our parents and grandparents.

New York–Daily protests and an ongoing park occupation in the financial district of New York City are gaining growing national attention as an expression of anger against Wall Street greed–and now the brutality of police against demonstrators, after the NYPD savagely attacked a march rom the encampment to Union Square on September 24.

Recently independent South Sudan will face chronic food shortages next year due to internal and border insecurity, erratic rains and a huge influx of returnees from the North, UN agencies have warned.

The FAO said a Rapid Crop Assessment carried out in August showed South Sudan was likely to produce 420,000-500,000MT of food this year – half the required amount.

New York, October 3, 2011– The stakes went up for the Occupy Wall Street protest movement this weekend after police escalated their repression with the arrest of over 700 peaceful protesters during a march across the Brooklyn Bridge on October 1.

The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights says Syrian military and security forces have killed at least 2,700 people; but activists and human rights groups put that number as high as 5,300.

While global spending on weapons is set up to further increase in spite of the economic recession, four major UN agencies and their aid partners have just appealed for $18.3 million to help tens of thousands of refugees who are fleeing into western Ethiopia to escape violence in Sudan’s Blue Nile state.

Over the past year, the world has watched with great interest as the Arab Spring has dissolved decades of repression. Citizens weary of injustice have stood up and demanded control of their destinies. I wish that oppressed people everywhere in Africa could benefit from the dramatic changes we are witnessing in North Africa.

The United Nations committee entrusted with helping countries tackle terrorism has voiced concern at the close connection between terrorists and transnational organized crime, including the illegal movement of nuclear, chemical, biological and other potentially deadly materials.

Palestinian Authority president Mahmoud Abbas handed over a request to UN secretary general Ban Ki-moon, asking the United Nations to admit the state of Palestine as a full member. Then he told the General Assembly “I call upon the distinguished members of the Security Council to vote in favour of our full membership.”

In the midst of the current stampede to slash federal spending, U.S. Congress might want to take a look at two unnecessary (and dangerous) “national security” programs that, if cut, would save the United States over a quarter of a trillion dollars over the next decade.