Category Archives: Global development

University vice-chancellor stands aside over blackmail claims in Pakistan

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Javed Iqbal denies involvement in scandal over alleged use of CCTV footage to extort money from students in Balochistan

The vice-chancellor of a university in the volatile region of Balochistan in Pakistan has temporarily stepped down from his role following the launch of an investigation into allegations of harassment and blackmail on campus.

Javed Iqbal said on Sunday that he was leaving his post at the University of Balochistan until the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) concluded its inquiry into claims that CCTV footage of students was used by university officials to blackmail them. Most of the students allegedly affected were female.

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Lake Chad shrinking? It’s a story that masks serious failures of governance | Oli Brown and Janani Vivekananda

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Our two-year study shows the lake has been stable since the 1990s. Costly ‘solutions’ shift focus from the complex causes of the region’s deadly crisis

Lake Chad is a hydrological miracle – a life-giving, freshwater lake in the Sahara desert. But the region around the lake has been engulfed in a violent crisis for more than a decade, which has left nearly 10 million people in urgent need of humanitarian assistance.

Military crackdowns on insurgent groups such as Boko Haram have failed to end the violence. Bringing durable peace to the region requires unpicking a Gordian knot of many interlinked factors: poverty, sectarian mistrust, political marginalisation and corruption. The risks posed by the climate crisis to the rainfall-dependent livelihoods of the people of Lake Chad are an important strand of this challenge.

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‘Whistles, warnings, kaboom!’: a day with a landmine clearance team | Jamie Fullerton

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Aki Ra was a child soldier for Pol Pot, laying mines around Siem Reap. Now he is using his expertise to clear land in rural Cambodia and make it safe again

The rusty tailfin of the mortar round can be seen poking through the roots and mud of a small dirt patch, next to a skull and crossbones sign.

Aki Ra thinks the bomb could have been lying in rural Siem Reap, Cambodia, for 40 years. If it hadn’t been found, it may have added another death to the approximately 20,000 people killed by explosives laid in the country from the late 1960s to the 1990s.

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Lawyers challenge UK imports of ‘slavery-tainted’ Uzbek cotton

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Rights team argues preferential tariffs promote goods produced by hundreds of thousands of unpaid labourers in Uzbekistan

The government is facing legal action to try and stop the importation of cotton harvested with state-sponsored forced labour from Uzbekistan into the UK.

The Uzbek-German Forum for Human Rights and the Global Legal Action Network (Glan), a team of human rights lawyers, are launching a judicial review of preferential tariffs applied to Uzbek cotton, arguing that it is promoting the importation of goods tainted with modern slavery. The country has faced sustained criticism over the mass enforced mobilisation of hundreds of thousands of Uzbeks to work as unpaid labourers during harvest and planting seasons.

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‘They paid a guy to kill me’: health workers fight homophobia in Uganda

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A lesbian activist in a rural town has developed a new strategy to reach those most at risk of HIV

Maria Nantale is enjoying a beer at a rickety wooden bar after a long day’s work. “Forty people tested today,” she reflects. “Found three positives. One of them is in denial. She has run away.”

Twice a week, from dawn until dusk, Nantale holds an “outreach” in the town of Mbale, population 76,000. The aim is to combat HIV among those most at risk: LGBT Ugandans, drug addicts and sex workers.

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The Nobel peace prize can inspire Abiy Ahmed to new heights in Ethiopia

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Global acclaim for the peace he forged with Eritrea should buoy a leader facing the persecution of ethnic minorities at home

The Nobel prize awarded last week to Ethiopia’s prime minister, Dr Abiy Ahmed, honoured his achievements as a peacemaker. Most widely recognised was his success in thawing relations with Eritrea, the breakaway republic with which Ethiopia had remained on a war footing since the country gained independence in 1993.

No less significant, however, was his management of the internal conflict between the Ethiopian government and protesters in Oromia, the region surrounding Addis Ababa, the capital. Rather than attempting to shut down the protests by force, Abiy acknowledged their grievances, and opened up political space. He freed political prisoners jailed by previous administrations, and restored the legitimacy of parties formerly branded as terrorist organisations.

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Experts dispel claims of China debt-trap diplomacy in Pacific but risks remain

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Beijing should substantially reform its lending practices, Lowy Institute says

China has not engaged in deliberate “debt-trap diplomacy” in the Pacific, but the burgeoning scale of China’s lending, and institutional weakness within Pacific states, pose clear risks for small states being overwhelmed by debt, a new report argues.

And an infrastructure arms race between China and other countries with interests in the region – including Australia – might only exacerbate the problem.

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Aid agencies accused of failure to make good on Oxfam abuse scandal pledges

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MPs point to lack of progress on promised safeguarding improvements for whistleblowers and survivors

MPs have accused aid organisations of “dragging their feet” over combating sexual exploitation and abuse in the sector, despite safeguarding pledges made in 2018 after the Oxfam abuse scandal.

Work to improve protection and support for whistleblowers has “stalled”, and more needs to be done to protect survivors, a report by the UK international development committee (IDC) has said.

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Wahala: trouble in the Niger delta – photo essay

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Photographer Robin Hinsch travelled to the Niger delta, visiting the gas flaring sites, artisanal refineries, and meeting the communities living in the hugely polluted environments caused by the oil industry

Covering 70,000 sq km (27,000 sq miles) of wetlands, the Niger delta was formed primarily by sediment deposition. It is home to more than 30 million people and 40 different ethnic groups, making up 7.5% of Nigeria’s total land mass.

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Up to 90% of 10-year-olds in world’s poorest countries struggle to read

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World Bank targets ‘learning poverty’ as research shows major shortfall in basic reading skills among least privileged children

Nine out of 10 children in the world’s poorest countries are unable to read a basic book by the age of 10 – a situation mirrored in reverse in rich countries, where only 9% cannot do so by the same age.

Data compiled by the World Bank and the UN also shows that when low- and middle-income countries are taken together – a total of 135 states – more than half of all children cannot read a simple text at 10 years old.

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Niger’s president blames explosive birth rate on ‘a misreading of Islam’

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Mahamadou Issoufou calls for ‘responsible parenthood’ as he warns population boom will undermine climate adaptation

A misreading of Islam led to Niger’s explosive birth rate, hampering the country’s fight to adapt to the climate crisis and preserve its shrinking resources, the country’s president has said.

This nexus of issues is likely to have an increasingly direct impact on European politics, said Mahamadou Issoufou, who warned warned that migration may exceed the levels it reached during the second world war.

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Soap opera could be unlikely form of birth control in Uganda

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An NGO has recut and overdubbed a Venezuelan telenovela to raise awareness of sexual health

Uganda has one of the highest birth rates in the world. It also has some of the most dedicated soap opera watchers anywhere in Africa.

Now a group of enterprising Ugandans is aiming to tackle the former through the medium of the latter. Soap operas are expensive to make, however, so they plan instead to “hack” a Venezuelan import, recutting the existing series and overdubbing it with Ugandan actors.

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Did children die because of ‘white saviour’ Renee Bach?

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Unqualified missionary denies she sought to portray herself as a doctor at centre where at least 105 children died

Zuriah Namutamba still has questions about how her grandson died. About whether the actions of a young American woman, a missionary without any medical training, contributed to Twalali Kifabi’s death.

Zuriah is not the only relative in Uganda demanding answers over the work of the US missionary organisation Serving His Children (SHC) and its founder, Renee Bach, who has now left the country.

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How do we feed the world without destroying it? | Bob Geldof

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An international summit next year will tackle the world’s most enduring crisis – hunger. Radical action is needed

Hunger is the most awful and profound expression of poverty. It exists in every country. It is something that most people can identify with on some perhaps primordial level. It is innate. The fear of hunger is etched into our DNA, passed down the generations from hungry, scared ancestors. It is in our bones. It is in my Irish bones.

First, the good news. For several decades global hunger has been decreasing. This is mostly thanks to the sweat and ingenuity of the 500 million smallholders who produce 80% of the food consumed in the developing world. It is also thanks to the work of exceptional NGOs, to economic growth and to the innovation of businesses all along the supply chain. It’s thanks, too, to the support of governments and international organisations. And it’s to increased political stability in some places.

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Kashmir families live in fear as loved ones are detained far from home

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Relatives tell of 1,000km bus journeys to Agra where prisoners are held after Modi crackdown

The last time he saw her, Mehraj-ud-din Wani assured his wife that he would soon be a free man.

Wani was speaking to his wife, Gulshan, from behind bars in Srinagar jail in Kashmir. “He was certain that he would be released,” she said. “He said that he will be home in a matter of days.”

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‘Failing’ food system leaves millions of children malnourished or overweight

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Unicef report finds poorest children at greatest risk, while price of healthy food in rich nations drives food poverty

At least one in three children under five are either undernourished or overweight, and one in two lack essential vitamins and nutrients, the UN children’s agency has warned.

The Unicef report laid bare the alarming rate at which poor diets and a “failing” food system are damaging children, saying that “millions are eating too little of what they need and millions are eating too much of what they don’t need: poor diets are now the main risk factor for the global burden of disease”.

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Qatar’s workers are at risk of heat stress for half the day during summer, finds UN

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A third of workers in study experienced dangerously high body temperatures, despite working ban during hottest periods

Migrant labourers working outdoors in Qatar face “high” or “extreme” risk of heat stress for more than half the working day during the four hottest months of the year, according to a UN report.

The findings come just weeks after the Guardian revealed that hundreds of workers may be dying due to exposure to Qatar’s intense summer heat.

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Higher temperatures driving ‘alarming’ levels of hunger – report

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Global hunger index finds countries affected by drought and conflict in sub-Saharan Africa have seen biggest increases in undernourished people

The climate crisis is driving alarming levels of hunger in the world, undermining food security in the world’s most vulnerable regions, according to this year’s global hunger index.

The annual report, a ranking of 117 countries measuring hunger rates and trends, shows progress since 2000 but warns that the world still has a long way to go to reach the zero hunger target agreed by world leaders by 2030.

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Orphans thought to be British rescued from Isis camp after Turkish attacks

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Children taken to safety in Raqqa after hundreds of people fled camp holding Islamic State affiliates in northern Syria

Three orphans believed to be British citizens have been evacuated from an area in northern Syria that was the focus of recent attacks by Turkish troops and their allies.

The Guardian understands that the three children, Amira, 10, her sister, Hiba, eight, and their brother, Hamza, were evacuated from a camp for people associated with Islamic State in Ain Issa on Sunday. They were part of a group of 24 children taken to safety by the UN refugee organisation.

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Workers making £88 Lululemon leggings claim they are beaten

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Exclusive: Upmarket brand, which has just launched UN partnership, opens investigation as female labourers in Bangladesh factory say they suffer regular abuse

Lululemon, an athleisure brand whose £88 leggings are worn by celebrities and Instagram influencers, are sourcing clothing from a factory where Bangladeshi female factory workers claim they are beaten and physically assaulted.

The Canadian brand recently launched a partnership with the United Nations to reduce stress levels and promote the mental health of aid workers.

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