The Week with IPS 5/9

	The 4th Century Art that Died Out Across the World and the Ethiopian Scribes Trying to Preserve it James Jeffrey Misganew Andeurgay changes his bamboo-made pen for another, dips it in a tiny pot of viscous liquid and, on a parchment page filled with black script, begins to trace in scarlet-red ink the Amharic word for god. For centuries Ethiopian scribes like Misganew have written holy texts in ... MORE > >
	Divisions over Gender Complicate Development Agenda Jonathan Rozen As the U.N. focuses on refining its Post-2015 Development Agenda, divisions surrounding issues of population and development continue to plague consensus on a universal way forward. “People have to be at the centre of development,” Dr. Babatunde Osotimehin, executive director of the U.N. ... MORE > >
	HIV/AIDS Highlights Gender Inequalities in Cuba Ivet González All illusions of love, trust and dedication to a relationship flew out the window for Mayda Torres in 1992, when she found out she was HIV-positive while undergoing routine exams to start a new job. “I had a stable relationship. I wasn’t unfaithful. And I hadn’t ever had a sexually transmitted ... MORE > >
	Desperate Gazans Turn Plastic Into Fuel Khaled Alashqar On the roof of a modest house amidst the alleys of Nusseirat refugee camp in central Gaza Strip, Ibrahim Sobeh and his sons spent more than 200 days working on a primitive device that converts waste plastic into fuel. “The idea came when I watched smoke emissions from a fireplace I made in my ... MORE > >
	Undocumented Students in U.S. Stuck in Limbo Jane Regan He did everything right. Worked hard. Excelled in school. Captain of his soccer team. He’s been scouted by a half-dozen colleges and universities. “I had six goals and I had about 28 assists. My team went to the state finals,” the quiet 18-year-old explained.3 But this star soccer player from ... MORE > >
	Community Electricity Lights Up Spain Inés Benítez Until recently it was inconceivable for small groups of organised citizens in fully electrified industrialised countries like Spain to generate their own power from clean sources of energy, challenging the prevailing energy model. But now anyone who wants to become an “agent of change” can be a ... MORE > >
	Born Free, and Disinterested Rebekah Funk South Africa’s May 7 elections mark the first time in democratic history that those born into Nelson Mandela’s post-apartheid ‘Rainbow Nation’ can vote. While these so-called “born frees” make up about two million of the country’s 31.4 million eligible voters, dismal registration numbers have ... MORE > >
	Fatwa Comes Too Late for Kashmir's Half-Widows Athar Parvaiz Forty-seven-year-old Shahmala’s husband has been missing since 1993. In India’s restive Jammu and Kashmir state, she is what is known as a half-widow, a woman who has no clue whether her husband is dead or alive. In December last year, a group of clerics issued a fatwa (Islamic decree) at a ... MORE > >
	Syrian Split Divides Christians Karlos Zurutuza Malki Hana says his men are afraid of cameras. “Most of them are army defectors and they may easily get in trouble," says this commander of a mostly unknown armed group in Syria. From his headquarters in Derik, 700 km northeast of Damascus, Hana, 34, briefs IPS on his militia comprising almost ... MORE > >
Raped, And Abandoned By Law Irfan Ahmed Amina Bibi, an 18-year-old from Pakistan’s Punjab province, was allegedly raped by four men on Jan. 5 this year. All the accused were granted bail. A desperate Amina set herself on fire outside a police station on Mar. 13 and succumbed to burn injuries the next day. The Supreme Court of Pakistan ... MORE > >
	A Price to Pay for Selling on the Street Neeta Lal Bhure Lal, a 33-year-old street-food vendor, has been selling his spicy ‘chaat’ outside the New Delhi Railway Station for 15 years. But despite a punishing 12-hour work schedule, and a new law to protect hawkers like him, he doesn’t take home enough to feed his family. More than half of Lal’s ... MORE > >
	Sinkholes Opening Up After Tsunami Malini Shankar While the United States Geological Survey (USGS) is sparing no effort to fill a rapidly widening sinkhole in Florida since Apr. 23, India’s Geological Survey has closed its field station in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands where sinkholes have sprung up all over as an aftermath of the 2004 Asian ... MORE > >
	Women Voters Win Abdullah Omeed About a third of the voters in the Afghanistan presidential election were women. That still gives Afghan women a say in running the country, as never before. The voting Apr. 5 saw a high turnout with seven million people, 60 percent of the voters, casting their vote. Afghan civil society ... MORE > >