Category Archives: Global development

Over 100,000 have fled Nicaragua since brutal 2018 crackdown, says UN

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Exodus expected to continue from Central American country, amid fears of repeat of state and police repression

More than 100,000 people have fled persecution in Nicaragua, with numbers set to rise, two years after the country was plunged into social and economic crisis, the UN’s refugee agency warned.

Even after a violent crackdown against nationwide anti-government protests in April 2018 had subsided, Nicaraguan students, human rights defenders, journalists and farmers have continued to seek asylum abroad at the rate of 4,000 a month.

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Lesbos coronavirus case sparks fears for refugee camp

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Wave of anti-migrant violence has left refugees without food and medical care – and more vulnerable to disease than ever before

News of a confirmed case of Covid-19 on Lesbos has sparked fears of the impact of an outbreak at the overcrowded Moria refugee camp, where refugees live in dire conditions with appalling hygiene and little medical care.

The troubling conditions in the camp have worsened this week, and tensions on the island have seen several NGOs forced to reduce or close services over safety fears.

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‘Not just where people kill each other’: the man hoping to transform Burundi

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With an election looming, Dieudonné Nahimana shares his vision for unity in a country scarred by ethnic violence

When civil war erupted in Burundi in 1993, like many children, the teenage Dieudonné Nahimana fled to the capital, Bujumbura, and ended up destitute.

He became the de facto leader of a group of 40 street children, surviving in the shelter of abandoned buildings. It was an experience that drove his ambition higher, sowing the seeds for a nation-building project and his decision to run for president.

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‘Project of death’: alarm at Bolsonaro’s plan for Amazon-spanning bridge

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Residents of riverside communities in the state of Pará are unconvinced by the Bolsonaro government’s claims of jobs and other benefits that a dramatic extension of a trans-Amazon highway would bring

From the veranda of her wooden home, Joaci da Silva looked out across her garden towards the waters of the River Amazon, and shuddered as she considered the future.

“Today we live in a paradise,” she said.

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Human rights activist ‘forced to flee DRC’ over child cobalt mining lawsuit

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Landmark legal action against world’s biggest tech companies lead to death threats, says activist Auguste Mutombo

A Congolese human rights activist has said he was forced to flee the country with his family after being linked to a lawsuit accusing the world’s largest tech companies of being complicit in the deaths of children in cobalt mines in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC).

In December, the Guardian revealed that a group of families from DRC were launching landmark legal action against Apple, Google, Tesla, Microsoft and Dell. They claim they aided and abetted the deaths and injuries of their children, who were working in mines that they say were linked to the tech companies.

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Schools close in north-east Kenya after al-Shabaab targets teachers

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Authorities face criticism for withdrawing teaching staff from an already marginalised region where education is badly needed

A series of targeted killings of schoolteachers by a militia group in Kenya has seen an exodus of staff and the closure of hundreds of schools across the north-east of the country.

Thousands of teachers have left their posts in the past two months following several suspected al-Shabaab attacks in the region.

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Pornhub needs to change – or shut down

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A petition is calling on the site to prevent non-consensual videos being posted – and highlights the lack of industry regulation

The news that 350,000 people – and counting – have signed a petition calling on Pornhub – the world’s most popular porn site – to stop posting non-consensual videos and marketing them as “pornography” is not surprising to me.

Pornhub’s argument that “extremists” are lobbying to shut them down is ridiculous. I’m non-religious, liberal and sex positive and in no way “anti-porn”.

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Seven out of 10 global health leaders are men – and change is half a century away

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‘Stagnant’ global health system is dominated by rich states, rooted in colonialism and undervalues women, says study

A small group of privileged men based in Europe and the US preside over a global health system which is 70% male, according to new research.

The Global Health 50/50 report, published on Monday by University College London’s Institute of Global Health, warns it could take 54 years until the world’s major health organisations have equality in their leadership.

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World’s biggest porn site under fire over rape and abuse videos

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Petition highlighting failure of Pornhub to protect rape and revenge porn victims has attracted over 350,000 signatures

An online petition accusing Pornhub, the UK’s biggest open access porn site, from profiting from videos of rape and sexual abuse has reached over 350,000 signatures.

Pornhub is the world’s biggest porn site and was visited 42bn times last year. It is free to access, with no age restrictions, and raises revenue through advertising and paid-for promotions by porn producers.

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UK urged to act over men facing death in Egypt for alleged childhood crimes

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Foreign secretary asked to intervene as death penalty hangs over four young men at mass trial in Cairo

A group of British MPs has called on the foreign secretary to intervene in the case of four young men facing a death sentence in Cairo for crimes they allegedly committed as children.

One of them is Ammar El Sudany, who was in the bath when Egyptian security forces raided his home.

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Snapshot sisterhood: women train the lens on women – in pictures

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To mark International Women’s Day, ActionAid is staging a photography exhibition that celebrates female trailblazers in poor countries – from the Guatemalan hip-hop artist who uses her music to champion feminism, to the founder of Kabul’s first yoga studio. All of the images, which are on show at the Oxo Tower in London until 8 March, are taken by female photographers

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Inside the cruise ship that became a coronavirus breeding ground

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As contagion swept through the Diamond Princess, its crew had to carry on working. Here, they recall the climate of chaos and fear that prevailed during the ship’s two-week quarantine

Christian Santos* remembers staying awake at night, anxiously listening to the sound of his colleague coughing. They were sleeping below deck, in one of the small rooms shared by workers on board the stricken Diamond Princess cruise ship.

He had spent the previous two weeks serving guests who were confined to their rooms, and watching the miserable failure of disease-control measures on the vessel. Now he knew the coronavirus, which had already transmitted to hundreds of people onboard, had almost certainly entered his own cabin.

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Sudan accused of masterminding lethal attacks on Khartoum protesters

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Inquiry finds that authorities armed and orchestrated security forces that killed more than 200 pro-democracy protesters

Sudanese security forces systematically planned and coordinated a series of deadly attacks that killed 241 pro-democracy protesters and injured hundreds more at a Khartoum sit-in last year, an inquiry has found.

Authorities “purposefully pre-positioned” state security forces armed with tear gas, whips and assault rifles in the month before the protests began, and “intentionally targeted” medical personnel and facilities during and after the protests, according to the New York-based advocacy organisation Physicians for Human Rights (PHR), which led an investigation into the violence.

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Save the Children ‘let down’ staff and public over sexual misconduct claims

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Charity Commission condemns ‘serious failures’ in handling of harassment allegations against senior staff

Save the Children “let down” its staff and the wider public over its handling of alleged sexual harassment and inappropriate behaviour by senior managers, according to a fiercely critical report published on Thursday.

The Charity Commission said the organisation’s handling of complaints against its former chief executive, Justin Forsyth, and Brendan Cox, its former policy director, amounted to mismanagement and had a “corrosive effect” on the organisation’s culture. The charity must work hard to rebuild its reputation, said the commission.

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UNAids chief vows to act after tribunal upholds staff harassment complaints

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Winnie Byanyima pledges to stamp out abuse after International Labour Organization rules that agency breached duty of care

The head of UNAids said the agency would “take stock, learn and become a stronger and better organisation” after a tribunal ruled that it had failed in its duty to deal adequately with complaints of staff harassment.

In an email to staff, Winnie Byanyima, who promised to stamp out abusive behaviour when she took over the agency in November, said losing a case at the International Labour Organization tribunal – the highest internal court of appeal – was “very significant”.

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Nine out of 10 people found to be biased against women

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Analysis of 75 countries reveals ‘shocking’ scale of global women’s rights backlash

Almost 90% of people are biased against women, according to a new index that highlights the “shocking” extent of the global backlash towards gender equality.

Despite progress in closing the equality gap, 91% of men and 86% of women hold at least one bias against women in relation to politics, economics, education, violence or reproductive rights.

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Save the Children chief resists calls to quit after damning watchdog inquiry

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Charity Commission accuses organisation of mishandling sexual harassment allegations levelled at former senior staff

The head of one of Britain’s biggest charities resisted calls to resign on Wednesday after a damning inquiry into the organisation’s handling of allegations of sexual harassment and inappropriate behaviour against senior managers.

A Charity Commission investigation into Save the Children’s handling of claims against Justin Forsyth and Brendan Cox, respectively the charity’s former chief executive and policy director, will be published on Thursday.

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Scientists turn to tech to prevent second wave of locusts in east Africa

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Researchers use supercomputer to predict potential breeding areas as food security fears grow

Scientists monitoring the movements of the worst locust outbreak in Kenya in 70 years are hopeful that a new tracking programme they will be able to prevent a second surge of the crop-ravaging insects.

The UN has described the locust outbreak in the Horn of Africa, and the widespread breeding of the insects in Kenya, Ethiopia and Somalia that has followed, as “extremely alarming”.

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Dutch authorities issue alert over missing pregnant asylum seekers

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At least 25 heavily pregnant women have disappeared from asylum shelters since November, sparking fears of trafficking and illegal adoption

This article is part of the Guardian’s This is Europe series

Dutch authorities have issued an alert over the disappearances of dozens of pregnant African women housed in asylum shelters in the Netherlands.

The unusual alert, seen by the Guardian and Argos Radio of the Netherlands, was put out by the Expertise Centre for Human Trafficking and Smuggling (EMM), a collaboration between the Dutch National Police, the Royal Netherlands Military Police, the Social Affairs and Employment Inspectorate and the Immigration Service.

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Girls stay longer in school but obesity, suicide and sexual violence remain risks

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A quarter of a century after world conference pledged to advance gender equality, reports finds opportunities and rights still lacking

Girls are far less likely to get married or drop out of school than ever before, but worryingly high rates of obesity, suicide and sexually transmitted infections underline how uneven global progress has been for them over the past 25 years, according to a report published on Wednesday.

Despite major gains in some aspects of girls’ lives since governments pledged at the fourth world conference on women in 1995 to advance the rights of women and girls, violence against them is still not only common but accepted, claim the UN children’s agency, Plan International, and UN Women. They warn that if discrimination continues, the 2030 gender equality targets are unlikely to be achieved.

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