Category Archives: Global development

Senior Libyan coastguard commander arrested for alleged human trafficking

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Abd al-Rahman Milad, known as Bija, is suspected of being behind the drowning of dozens of refugees

The UN-backed government in Libya has arrested a coastguard commander alleged to be one of the world’s most ruthless human traffickers.

On Wednesday, authorities in Tripoli said Abd al-Rahman Milad, known as Bija, and suspected of being behind the drowning of dozens of people, has been arrested in the Hay-al-Andalus district of the city and is now being detained by Rada special forces.

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Pressure grows on Zimbabwe to free detained student leader

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International groups join calls for the release of Takudzwa Ngadziore, held for protesting against Mnangagwa’s regime

A campaign focusing on the detention of 22-year-old Takudzwa Ngadziore, who has been held for 30 days in a remand prison, is gaining momentum in Zimbabwe, putting pressure on President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s government to release the student.

Ngadziore, president of the Zimbabwe National Students Union (Zinasu), was arrested and jailed last month for protesting outside a car hire company, Impala Car Rental. The company has been under pressure from campaigners to release details of the alleged use of one of their vehicles in the suspected abduction of another student activist, Tawanda Muchehiwa.

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Army warn they are on standby as police brutality protests intensify in Nigeria

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At least 10 are dead and dozens injured in street demonstrations demanding an end to widespread abuses by security forces

Nigeria’s army has warned it could step in against “subversive elements and troublemakers” as the protests against police brutality that have erupted throughout the country over the past week continue.

Thousands of mainly young people have taken to the streets to protest against the notorious Special Anti-Robbery Squad, commonly known as Sars, long accused of unlawful killings and abuse, and against wider police brutality. At least 10 people have died and dozens injured in the demonstrations, which have been met with force by police units.

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‘Not just a dog bite’: why India is struggling to keep rabies at bay

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The government is being urged to dispel myths and ensure drugs are available – and take responsibility for the millions of stray dogs

By the time the patient, a young man, reached Dr Ramesh Masthi at a Bengaluru hospital, it was too late to save him. After being bitten by a pack of stray dogs as he went out to buy some milk, his family had applied a paste of green chillis, then lime juice and finally, when the wound looked gruesome, turmeric.

“He came about a week after he was bitten. The wound was serious, and we couldn’t save him. There is so much ignorance about dog bites and myths. A rabies shot in time would have saved him,” Masthi says.

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Ending world hunger by 2030 would cost $330bn, study finds

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Research suggests that by targeting enhanced aid money more effectively and with greater innovation, a solution is possible

Ending hunger by 2030 would come with a price tag of $330bn (£253bn), according to a study backed by the German government.

Research groups compiled data from 23 countries and found international donors would need to add another $14bn a year to their spending on food security and nutrition over the next 10 years; more than twice their current contribution. Low and middle-income countries would also have to give another $19bn a year, potentially through taxation.

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Fruits of shared labour: the Indian women joining forces for food security

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Rural women in Tamil Nadu are mostly excluded from land ownership, but collective farms can offer self-sufficiency

When all the shops closed due to the coronavirus lockdown, small collectives were key to remaining self-sufficient for marginalised farmers in India’s southern state of Tamil Nadu.

“We had sufficient grains and vegetables at home, while others in the village were seeking government support,” says 46-year-old Poongani, one of the widowed Dalit women among the nine members of the Sivanthi Poo farming collective in the village of Thottampatti.

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Firefighters battle to contain blaze on Kilimanjaro

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Fears for climbers who may have been in area of fire on slopes of Africa’s tallest mountain near Tanzanian border with Kenya

A huge fire has broken on Kilimanjaro, Africa’s highest peak and a key attraction for tourists in Kenya and Tanzania.

According to Tanzanian national park authorities, the fire broke out on Sunday afternoon and is yet to be contained.

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‘They have to be punished’: the mothers trapped in the UAE by ‘love crimes’

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Single migrant women left destitute by Covid can’t leave until they have served sentences for sex outside marriage – but virus restrictions mean prisons won’t accept them

When Reyna* took a taxi to Al-Awir prison in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, she was hoping to turn herself in and be admitted as an inmate. The former domestic worker from the Philippines had brought her three-month-old son along with her.

Reyna lost her job during the pandemic; she can no longer pay for their rent or food and wants to return to her homeland. But in order to be permitted to leave the UAE she must first serve a jail sentence for having sex outside marriage, which is illegal under the country’s Islamic laws.

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‘Drastic rise’ in Malawi’s suicide rate linked to Covid economic downturn

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Lack of specialist support and growing unemployment are factors in growing mental health crisis, doctors say

One Tuesday morning in March, 48-year-old farmer Lokoliyo Bwanali set off for his maize plot. He never came back. Neighbours discovered his body later in the small field where he had poisoned himself.

“The wife of the deceased said her late husband was under pressure from creditors and was failing to settle his debts,” said Edward Kabango, from Malawi’s Dedza district police department. “The deceased left his home without explaining to his family members where he was heading until he was later found lying dead in a field, a kilometre from his home.”

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Les misérables nouveau: the lives of Filipina workers in the playground of the rich

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Thomas Morel-Fort went undercover to capture the lives of undocumented workers toiling inside the Paris and Côte d’Azur homes of the wealthy

At first glance, French photographer Thomas Morel-Fort’s work has all the trappings of a modern-day fairytale: princesses in lavish Parisian mansions; holidays in hilltop villas on the Côte d’Azur; promises of wealth and prosperity.

But his photographs reveal a grittier reality. Morel-Fort’s lens instead alights on the unseen Cinderellas, the Filipino women hired to cook, clean, iron, babysit and obey any commands that come their way, completely beholden to the whims of their demanding, powerful employers.

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‘He became a hero’: Bolsonaro sees popularity surge as Covid-19 spreads

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Emergency aid payments have helped Brazil’s president win support despite the virus raging. But things could soon change

Brazil’s hard-right president, Jair Bolsonaro, dismissed Covid-19 as a “little flu”, and said it should be faced “like a man, not a boy”.

He sneered that self-isolating was “for the weak” and raged against lockdown measures. He clashed with state governors, and his own former health minister savaged his handling of the pandemic.

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Aid cuts and Covid force Uganda refugees to brink of starvation

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More than 90,000 face extreme hunger with another 400,000 hit by food crisis, says report

Nearly 500,000 refugees in Uganda are struggling to eat as a result of cuts to food aid and Covid-19 restrictions.

More than 91,000 people living in 13 refugee settlements around the country are experiencing extreme levels of hunger, according to the latest analysis by the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC), published this week. More than 400,000 refugees are considered to be at crisis hunger levels.

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Gang violence erupts in Bangladesh Rohingya camps forcing families to flee

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Fighting leaves seven dead as rival factions fight for control of drugs trade and terrorise vulnerable refugees

Fighting between rival gangs in the Rohingya refugee settlements in Bangladesh has forced hundreds of people to leave their shelters in a week where at least seven have died.

“When it is night, it becomes hell. When you try to sleep you hear a lot of firing, you hear a lot of bullets, people are screaming, people are fleeing from home,” said a Rohingya refugee who lives close to where the fighting has taken place.

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UN accused over failure to investigate ‘war on drugs’ killings in the Philippines

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Human rights groups calling for a probe into president Rodrigo Duterte’s anti-narcotics crackdown say abuses continue

The UN human rights council has been accused of a “collective failure” over its decision not to call for an investigation into the tens of thousands of killings alleged to have occurred under Philippine president Rodrigo Duterte’s “war on drugs”.

Human rights groups and UN experts had repeatedly called for an inquiry into the anti-narcotics crackdown, launched by the president after he won the 2016 election on a promise to rid the country of drugs.

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West and central Africa’s closed schools putting children at risk, Unicef warns

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Only seven out of 24 countries have reopened classrooms with Covid-safe measures, leaving millions unable to access education

Only one in three countries in west and central Africa have reopened their schools, leaving children at risk of child marriage, early pregnancy and recruitment by local armed groups, Unicef has warned.

Six months after schools across the region closed under lockdown measures, just seven out of 24 countries – Benin, Burkina Faso, Cabo Verde, Chad, the Republic of the Congo, Equatorial Guinea and Sierra Leone – have been able to put measures in place to make classrooms safe for reopening, including hygiene stations and social distancing.

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Sabrina Dhowre Elba: ‘The old idea of aid is dead’

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The Canadian model and Ifad ambassador explains how she and husband Idris Elba hope to make a difference to rural communities in Africa

Since her marriage to British actor Idris Elba last year, Sabrina Dhowre Elba has found her love of Africa being rekindled. But it was her mother who persuaded Elba to take up her new role as an activist.

The actress and Vogue cover model is being credited with convincing the Canadian government to be the first to pledge $6m (£3.5m) to a UN agency Covid fund for struggling farmers after a persuasive Zoom chat with ministers while the Elbas were themselves in isolation with mild cases of the virus.

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‘We’re being massacred’: Colombia accused of failing to stop murders of activists

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At least 223 social leaders have been murdered this year as Amnesty International report condemns government inaction

Activists in Colombia have warned that they continue to face extermination despite the coronavirus pandemic, as Amnesty International accused the country’s government of doing little to protect them.

At least 223 social leaders – community activists defending human, environmental, and land rights – have been murdered this year, according to local watchdog Indepaz.

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‘Moria 2.0’: refugees who escaped fire now living in ‘worse’ conditions

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More than 7,500 people living in tents on squalid settlement, with two other camps on Lesbos set to close

Thousands of people who fled the fire that destroyed the infamous Moria refugee camp in Lesbos, Greece, last month are living in dire and unsanitary conditions in a temporary settlement with little access to water or basic sanitation.

Just over 7,500 people are now living in tents among the rubble and dust of a former shooting range in an informal settlement that has become known as “Moria 2.0”.

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Turkey and UAE openly flouting UN arms embargo to fuel war in Libya

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Guardian joint investigation finds both sides send military cargo planes to region, in blatant violation of agreement to end conflict

Turkey and the United Arab Emirates are carrying out regular and increasingly blatant violations of the UN arms embargo on Libya, fuelling a proxy war that is evading political solutions, a joint investigation by the Guardian has found.

Flight data and satellite images show both nations using large-scale military cargo planes to funnel in goods and fighters to forces or proxies inside Libya, routinely violating the 2011 UN arms embargo despite political promises to abstain.

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Women’s health organisation president resigns following bullying and racism investigation

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Françoise Girard and two others cleared of racial discrimination but report finds culture of fear and intimidation at IWHC

The president of a women’s health charity has resigned following an investigation into allegations of racism and bullying within the organisation.

The findings of the independent investigation cleared Françoise Girard and two other senior managers at the International Women’s Health Coalition (IWHC) of unlawful racial discrimination or retaliation against employees.

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