Barrister urges landmark appeal hearing for courts in England and Wales to set aside decision that father should be allowed contact with child
A family court judge has come under fire for “wholly inappropriate” comments made to a young mother during a private hearing on child contact arrangements.
Judge Richard Scarratt made the mother “fearful” and put pressure on her to accept that the child have contact with her father, a barrister representing the mother has claimed.
Continue reading...Natsiraishe Maritsa saw so many friends being forced into marriage that she started a campaign to drive out the practice.
It is 11am on a Sunday and Natsiraishe Maritsa, 17, is running through some workout drills with a group of sweating teenage girls from her neighbourhood in Epworth, a poor township nine miles (15km) south-east of the capital, Harare.
On a normal Sunday, Maritsa and her friends would be attending church, but the strict 30-day lockdown imposed by the government earlier this month has banned religious gatherings – so it’s time to catch up on a taekwondo training session.
Continue reading...A constitutional reform would require a three-quarters majority in congress to overturn Latin America’s most draconian ban
Legislators in Honduras are pushing a constitutional reform through Congress that would make it virtually impossible to legalise abortion in the country – now or in the future.
Related: Argentina legalizing abortion will spur reform in Latin America, minister says
Continue reading...UN calls for help as cholera breaks out with the arrival of rainy season, compounding ‘dire’ situation in Cabo Delgado
Northern Mozambique has lurched into a humanitarian crisis as growing numbers of people have lost their homes amid escalating conflict.
Fighting in the northern province of Cabo Delgado displaced more than 500,000 people last year and on Wednesday UN agencies said they were deeply worried about the current situation and called for the international community to do more to help.
Continue reading...The UN calls for the resumption of state-led operations in the Mediterranean, as rescue groups’ vessels are detained in port
At least 43 people have been killed after a boat carrying migrants capsized off the Libyan coast, the UN said on Wednesday.
Ten people survived the shipwreck, which happened after the boat’s engine failed a few hours after departing the coastal city Zawiya, west of the capital Tripoli, on Tuesday morning.
Continue reading...The president-elect has promised to do away with ‘Remain in Mexico’ policy, raising hopes that asylum seekers claims will be treated seriously
Selma López, 31, has spent nearly a year holed up in a two-room house not far from Mexico’s border with the US, along with her 11-year-old son Darikson and another woman who also made the long journey from Honduras in search of a new life.
Related: Remain in Mexico policy needlessly exposed migrants to harm, report says
Continue reading...Unemployment – especially among the young – falling living standards and lockdowns have sparked riots across the country
Ettadhamen, a marginalised district on the outskirts of Tunis, wears unrest well. Over the weekend and into this week, violent protests have dominated life in this overlooked and restive place.
The district is not unique. Over the past few days, protests have erupted in working-class neighbourhoods in at least 15 locations across Tunisia, in response to declining living conditions, poverty and endemic unemployment, especially among the country’s young people.
Continue reading...Despite government loans and staff trickling back to work, the pandemic has made survival precarious for the city’s vendors
On a normal working day, Venkateshwara Rao would be ready by 4pm, stationed on the pavement waiting for office workers to emerge and order their favourite varieties of idli and dosa from his bandi, a food cart grandly named Kavyajyotika Tiffin Centre.
“When the lockdown was lifted, but with many restrictions still in place, the inflow of customers plummeted. However, the last few weeks have been good with a handful of workers back in offices and people lining up for takeaways at my bandi,” says Rao.
Continue reading...Frontex director Fabrice Leggeri accused over failure to appoint officers to protect people’s rights, with home affairs commissioner calling for ‘clarity’
The head of the EU’s border force is under growing pressure to stand down after being accused by the European commission of acting unlawfully and giving misleading evidence to MEPs.
The allegations against Fabrice Leggeri, the executive director of Frontex, relate to the agency’s failure to recruit any of the 40 officers it is obliged to employ to protect the rights of people crossing into Europe.
Continue reading...Food price increases and economic impact of lockdowns have left a quarter of the kingdom’s population reliant on food aid, UN warns
Almost a quarter of Lesotho’s population will require food aid between January and March as a result of Covid-19 restrictions, the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) has warned.
More than 580,000 people out of a population of 2.2 million are estimated to be food insecure, despite predictions of normal to above average rains this year and the potential for above average cereal production.
Continue reading...Scores of Dominican women die each year from botched attempts to end unwanted pregnancies
As Argentina becomes the first major Latin American country to fully legalize abortion, activists in the Dominican Republic fear their own government is banishing its women to the dark ages by upholding a total ban first implemented in 1884.
The Dominican Republic is one of four countries in Latin America – along with Honduras, Nicaragua and El Salvador – where abortion is illegal in all circumstances.
Continue reading...UK-based security firm faces calls to repay charges made by recruitment agents for jobs in Gulf states and conflict zones
Migrant workers working for the British security company G4S in the United Arab Emirates have collectively been forced to pay millions of pounds in illegal fees to recruitment agents to secure their jobs, the Guardian can reveal.
An investigation into G4S’s recruitment practices has found that workers from south Asia and east Africa have been made to pay up to £1,775 to recruitment agents working for the British company in order to get jobs as security guards for G4S in the UAE.
Forcing workers to pay recruitment fees is a widespread practice, but one that is illegal in the UAE, Qatar and Saudi Arabia. The practice allows companies to pass on the costs of recruitment to workers from some of the poorest countries in the world, leaving many deep in debt and vulnerable to modern forms of slavery, such as debt bondage.
India launches bid to vaccinate 300m people amid fears over efficacy of domestically produced vaccine
Emerging from Holy Family hospital in New Delhi, Ram Verma, a sanitation worker, breathed a deep sigh of relief. As one of the first in India to receive a coronavirus vaccine on Saturday – marking the start of the world’s largest vaccination programmes – he had been feeling a little jittery.
“I must admit I was nervous,” said Verma, who had received his Covaxin jab in a centre set up in the hospital car park. “A lot of us were. I thought I might faint or have side-effects. After all, it is something totally new. But I’m fine. There is nothing to worry about.”
Continue reading...As opposition leader’s home is surrounded by army and police he says he fears for his life
The party of the Ugandan opposition leader Bobi Wine says it is preparing to challenge President Yoweri Museveni’s election victory as it condemned what it called the house arrest of Wine and his wife.
Amid growing international concern about the conduct of the election, Wine said in an interview from his house, where he is surrounded by army and police, that he was “worried about my life and the life of my wife”.
Continue reading...Vouchers and money to buy food bring families the dignity everyone deserves, as the World Food Programme has shown
Dignity is not a word that you would normally associate with your weekly supermarket shop, or with planning how you might be going to feed your children each night.
But right now, when families are under intense pressure to find enough money to keep food on the table and ensure their children have access to a healthy and nutritious diet, dignity is something we should all be demanding for those who depend on others for the means to feed their loved ones.
Continue reading...Disparity with white women shows need for action, doctors say, despite slight improvement in mortality rate
Black women are still four times more likely than white women to die in pregnancy or childbirth in the UK, and women from Asian ethnic backgrounds face twice the risk, according to a new report.
The data shows a slight narrowing of the divide – last year’s report found black women were five times more likely to die – but experts say that is statistically insignificant and not a sign of progress.
Continue reading...Focus must be on justice for those fleeing impact of extreme weather events, says new scientific adviser to Vatican
The pope’s newly appointed scientific adviser said the coronavirus pandemic has forced world leaders to face up to the “existential risk” of the climate crisis.
Prof Ottmar Edenhofer said rich countries now had a moral duty to compensate poor countries already suffering the impacts.
Continue reading...Delays in publication of official list of those killed and wounded provokes anger and claims of government indifference
Moslem Kasdallah rests on his crutches, the stump of his amputated leg on display. His voice hoarse, he yells the demands that, after years of delay, have brought him and the other wounded and bereaved of the Tunisian revolution to the steps of the government building they have been occupying since December.
Some are on hunger strike, others have sewn their lips shut. Kasdallah carries a bottle of fuel and a lighter, ready to self-immolate.
Continue reading...Drive to immunise 3.5% of the population in weeks comes ahead of the lunar new year festival and as three major cities are locked down
At a Shenzhen hospital, 21-year-old airport worker Wang Shuyue lines up to receive her second shot.
“I feel it’s safe because so many people around the country have taken the vaccine so there shouldn’t be any major problems,” she tells the Guardian. “I think it should be effective otherwise there wouldn’t be so many people taking it.”
Continue reading...‘I am very confident there will be a change,’ Elizabeth Gómez Alcorta says as new law goes into effect
Argentina’s historic decision to legalize abortion will help spur reform across Latin America, the country’s gender minister has told the Guardian, as a new law allowing the practice goes into effect.
The bill passed by congress on 30 December made Argentina the first major Latin American country to legalize abortion. It will be signed into law on Thursday evening by the president, Alberto Fernández, marking a turning point for a region where the Catholic church has been a major cultural and political influence for centuries.
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