The Week with IPS 11/05/2016

  2016/11/4

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	Nicaragua’s Elections Marked by Apathy and Mistrust José Adán Silva In the midst of unusual political tension and apathy, Nicaraguans will go to the polls on Sunday Nov. 6 to vote in elections marked by the absence of the main opposition force and international election observers. The governing Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN) dominates the country’s ... MORE > >
	Data Innovation Powering Sustainable Development Goals Magdy Martinez-Soliman The world is awash with data. Today, more data than ever in human history is produced on a daily basis. Every time a person carries a cell phone from one place to another, tops up her mobile airtime or posts on social media, new data is created. The rapid increase of large data sets along ... MORE > >
	Privatization Cure Often Worse Than Malady Jomo Kwame Sundaram and Anis Chowdhury Privatization of SOEs has been a cornerstone of the neo-liberal counterrevolution that swept the world from the 1980s following the economic crisis brought about by US Fed’s sharp hike in interest rates. Developing countries, seeking aid from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World ... MORE > >
	Journalist Murders: The Ultimate Form of Censorship Lindah Mogeni The UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) has condemned the killing of more than 800 journalists globally since 2006. A measly seven percent of these murders have been solved. The protection of journalists and fighting against impunity is part of the UN’s 16th ... MORE > >
	President of UNGA Disillusioned by Unsustainable Development Lyndal Rowlands Development should be about more than building roads or buying air conditioners, the President of the UN General Assembly, Peter Thomson told IPS in a recent interview. Thomson, who started his career working as “a rural development man in Fiji” says he had become disillusioned with ... MORE > >
	Toxic Air - The ‘Invisible Killer’ that Stifles 300 Million Children Baher Kamal About 300 million children in the world are living in areas with outdoor air so toxic – six or more times higher than international pollution guidelines – that it can cause serious health damage, including harming their brain development. This shocking finding has just been revealed by the ... MORE > >
	Rural Malawians About to Go Online Charity Chimungu Phiri This month, many Malawians, especially those in rural areas, will be able to start accessing the internet as easily as opening a tap to get water. At least that’s the dream of C3, a communication services provider and the first commercial entity to deploy countrywide TV White Spaces-TVWS for a ... MORE > >
	Int'l Effort to Help Ethiopia Shoulder Its Refugee Burden James Jeffrey A concerned-looking group of refugees gather around a young woman grimacing and holding her stomach, squatting with her back against a tree. But this is no refugee camp, rather the Jesuit Refugee Service (JRS) compound just off a busy main road leading to Sidist Kilo roundabout in the Ethiopian ... MORE > >
	Q&A: Bangladesh’s ‘Higher Trajectory of Development’ Not Easy but Achievable Mahfuzur Rahman Bangladesh, a country of 160 million people, has made significant progress in its efforts to accelerate economic growth, reduce poverty and promote social development, but it now faces certain challenges in consolidating these achievements and marching forward on the higher trajectory of ... MORE > >
	Reparations owed for “Racial Terrorism” says UN Committee Phoebe Braithwaite Stressing the enduring relationship between injuries inflicted by slavery and contemporary injustices, a UN committee has recently issued a strongly-worded call for reparations for black U.S. Americans. “A systemic ideology of racism ensuring the domination of one group over another ... MORE > >
	Africa and the Paris Agreement: Which Way Forward? Friday Phiri The Paris Agreement on climate change is set to enter into force on Nov. 4, after it passed the required threshold of at least 55 Parties, accounting for an estimated 55 per cent of the total global greenhouse gas emissions, ratifying the agreement. The landmark deal, reached at the 21st ... MORE > >
	Dying to Get to Europe Baher Kamal They are not just data or numbers for statistical calculations. They are desperate human beings fleeing wars, violence, abuse, slavery and death. They hear and believe the bombastic speeches about democracy and human rights and watch the many images of welfare and good life in Europe. They are ... MORE > >