Category Archives: Global development

‘We never stopped protesting’: Iran’s youth take freedom fight underground

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Students tell of secret acts of defiance ahead of the first anniversary of Mahsa Amini’s death in police custody

Young Iranians have taken their protests against the authoritarian regime underground one year on from the death in custody of a 22-year-old woman detained for allegedly wearing the Islamic headscarf incorrectly.

The death of Mahsa Amini on 16 September last year led to the largest wave of popular unrest for years in Iran and a brutal crackdown by security services in response, with hundreds of men, women and children killed and thousands more injured, according to human rights groups.

At the beginning of the uprising, one of these two women, both 25, was arrested at a protest gathering and spent 16 days in prison. One of her fellow inmates was Yalda Aghafazli, a 19-year-old protester who died under suspicious circumstances after her release

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‘Towns were erased’: Libyan reporters on the ‘horrifying, harrowing’ aftermath of floods

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Journalists who reported on last week’s catastrophic storm say the country’s bloody political tussle has contributed to the collapse of services

Early last week, Mohamed Eljabo travelled to the eastern provinces of Libya, passing through Derna, Al Bayda and Sousa, and what he saw he describes as “shock beyond comprehension”.

“I have visited these cities before and I know them well,” he says. “I expected to find these cities when I made the journey from Tripoli. I expected to see the neighbourhoods and towns. But these were gone. Erased. It was horrifying.”

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Quarter of schools closed in Burkina Faso as fighting escalates after coup

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Nearly 1 million children denied education, along with many more across eight countries in central and west Africa, new report warns

A quarter of schools are now closed in Burkina Faso after a sharp rise in fighting between militants and the government, according to a new report that warns of a looming education crisis in the region.

The number of schools closed in the country rose by almost a third over the past year to 6,149, affecting close to 1 million students.

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Iran’s ‘gender apartheid’ bill could jail women for 10 years for not wearing hijab

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Shops that serve unveiled women could be shut under draft law UN human rights body says suppresses women into ‘total submission’

Women in Iran face up to 10 years in prison if they continue to defy the country’s mandatory hijab law, under harsher laws awaiting approval by authorities. Even businesses that serve women without a hijab face being shut down.

The stricter dress code, which amounts to “gender apartheid”, UN experts said, comes one year after the death in custody of Mahsa Amini, 22, who had been detained for allegedly wearing the Islamic headscarf incorrectly. Her death, after allegedly being beaten by police, led to the largest wave of popular unrest for years in Iran.

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Zimbabwe’s president accused of nepotism after appointing son and nephew

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Emmerson Mnangagwa also criticised for inflating size of cabinet and reappointing underperforming ministers

The Zimbabwean president, Emmerson Mnangagwa, recently returned to power after a disputed election, has been accused by the opposition of attempting to create a family dynasty after appointing his son as deputy finance minister barely a week on from conferring his wife with an honorary doctorate.

Announcing his new cabinet on Monday, Mnangagwa said one of his younger sons, David Kudakwashe Mnangagwa, would be second in charge at the Treasury, while appointing a nephew, Tongai, as deputy minister in the tourism minstry.

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Climate crisis: Africa is talking but is the west listening?

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Africa’s largest meeting on the crisis finished last week amid arguments over ‘false solutions’ and unfulfilled promises. But will the lofty ideals presented translate into better lives for Africans?

More than a dozen African leaders stood outside Kenyatta International Convention Centre in Nairobi last Wednesday to review what had been billed as the continent’s largest meeting on the climate crisis.

Earlier that morning, the Nairobi Declaration had been adopted as a blueprint to guide the continent in future negotiations with the west in global forums such as the G20 meeting; the UN general assembly; the annual meetings of the World Bank Group and the International Monetary Fund; and Cop28.

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Morocco earthquake: France ‘ready to help’ despite frosty diplomatic relations

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France offers €5m to assist disaster relief efforts amid political rift between Rabat and Paris

France’s foreign minister has said it is up to Morocco whether to seek French aid in dealing with its deadliest earthquake in more than six decades, and France is ready to help if asked.

Catherine Colonna said France had pledged €5m (£4.3m) to aid organisations in the north African country, where at least 2,500 people are believed to have died and a further 2,400 have been injured, but it was for Morocco to decide who it officially asked for assistance.

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Better nutrition can cut risk of TB deaths by 60%, Indian study finds

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Large-scale field trials that provided healthy food packages to sufferers and their families showed radical reductions in fatalities

Infectious, deadly and long associated with poverty, tuberculosis causes weight loss, while poor diets increase the likelihood of developing the disease. Now, a study in India has found that improved nutrition can cut the risk of death by 60% and reduce the chances of infection within families by about 40%.

India has the highest burden of TB and TB deaths globally and has launched an ambitious plan to reduce incidence and death rates by 80% and 90% respectively by 2025.

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G20: EU and US back trade corridor linking Europe, Middle East and India

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Joe Biden describes ambitious rail and sea plan to counter China’s Belt and Road project as a ‘really big deal’

The US and the EU have backed an ambitious plan to build an economic corridor linking Europe with the Middle East and India via rail and sea, a project the US president, Joe Biden, described as a “really big deal”.

The Indian prime minister, Narendra Modi, and the European commission president, Ursula von der Leyen, announced the project during a Saturday afternoon session at the G20 leaders’ summit, being held in Delhi this weekend.

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Ethiopian troops accused of mass killings of civilians in Amhara region

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Exclusive: Witnesses say federal forces have been looting villages and shooting farmers in their hunt for defiant Fano militiamen

Ethiopian soldiers killed more than 70 civilians and looted properties in a town in Amhara, multiple witnesses have claimed.

The killings took place in Majete, a rural town in north-eastern Ethiopia, after two weeks of heavy fighting between federal soldiers and the Fano, an Amhara militia.

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Climate adaptation finance to Africa must increase tenfold, research shows

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Countries forced to choose between climate resilience, fighting poverty and paying debts, says Ban Ki-moon

The flow of climate adaptation finance to Africa must increase up to tenfold by 2035 to meet the deepening effects of the climate crisis, according to research.

As the Africa Climate Summit continued in Nairobi, campaigners spoke of the desperate need to get funding to people who are already being affected by climate change. Africa, the region most impacted by the climate emergency, receives only 3% of global climate finance.

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Parents in Pakistan could be jailed for polio vaccine refusal

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New law in Sindh introduces ‘extraordinary measures’ to ensure vaccination of children against range of infectious diseases

Parents in Pakistan who refuse to get their children vaccinated against infectious diseases could be jailed or fined under a new law introduced in Sindh province.

The introduction of the legislation is an attempt to eradicate polio, which is endemic in Pakistan, but will cover vaccines for diphtheria, tetanus, whooping cough (pertussis), measles, mumps and rubella.

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Pakistan in uproar as protests over soaring energy prices turn violent

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Traders close shops, electricity bills are set alight and utility firm staff are attacked as anger rises over living costs and political strife

Protests against rising electricity and petrol prices have rocked Pakistan over the past week, with thousands taking to city streets and setting their electricity bills alight.

The cost of electricity has doubled in the last three months to about 50 rupees (12p) a kilowatt. Petrol prices have shot up from 262 rupees a litre in June to 305 rupees this month.

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Gangs forcing hundreds of thousands of people into cybercrime in south-east Asia, says UN

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Organised criminals use threats, torture and sexual violence to coerce victims to work in international scamming operations

Hundreds of thousands of people have been trafficked and forced to work for online scamming operations in south-east Asia run by criminal gangs, according to a UN report.

Billions of dollars are being generated each year by gangs who coerce victims into cybercrime, where they are subject to threats, torture and sometimes sexual violence, said the report, published by the UN human rights office on Tuesday.

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Rape still a weapon of war in Tigray months after peace deal

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Medical records from across the region show sexual violence continues to be used ‘to intimidate and terrorise communities’

Eritrean and Ethiopian soldiers continue a widespread and systematic campaign of rape in Tigray despite the peace agreement signed in November last year, a new report reveals.

In the first report to document sexual violence – using hundreds of medical records from the start of the conflict in November 2020 through to June 2023 – healthcare professionals recount cases of gang-rape, sexual slavery and murder, including the killing of children.

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Civilians targeted in war-torn Khartoum as poor and elderly remain trapped

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Latest atrocities in Sudan war include the shelling of house of traditional healer, who died with her children and neighbours

People trapped in the Sudanese capital, Khartoum, and its twin city of Omdurman say civilians are being deliberately targeted in shelling by the warring parties.

A woman who had been helping wounded soldiers was killed along with her three children and six neighbours when her home was shelled by Sudanese army forces earlier this week.

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Hospital detentions for new mothers challenged in Ugandan court

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Two cases to be heard this month could serve as legal precedent to outlaw the holding of patients against their will for unpaid bills

Two women who were prevented from leaving hospital over unpaid medical bills are to have their case against Ugandan authorities heard this month in a case that lawyers hope will end the practice.

Akello Esther Susan, 23, and NS (known by her initials) are jointly suing the government, two district councils and church dioceses over their treatment after giving birth in 2020 and 2021 respectively.

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‘Gigantic step backwards’: far-right gains in Chile threaten abortion rights

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Concerns mount as ultraconservative Republican party’s ‘right to life’ proposal could be enshrined in constitution

The hard-won right to an abortion in Chile is at risk of being overturned, activists have warned, as the country’s far right moves to enshrine protection for “the life of the unborn child and maternity” in a new constitution.

Concerns have grown over the ultraconservative Republican party’s plans to pare back reproductive rights in Chile as it now holds significant sway in the fate of the country’s constitutional saga.

“Clearly, there is great concern over the risks to women and children implied by the suggested amendments, which threaten the most basic rights of human beings,” said Lieta Vivaldi, the director of Alberto Hurtado University’s gender and social justice programme.

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George Soros foundation’s retreat from Europe could ‘turn off the lights’ for human rights

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Activists fear the billionaire’s legacy will be lost as his Open Society Foundations curbs its activities across the EU

He survived the Nazi occupation of his native Hungary, made a fortune on Wall Street and became one of the most steadfast backers of democracy and human rights in the eastern bloc.

But human rights activists and independent media fear the legacy of billionaire philanthropist George Soros, 93, could be about to be undone in his homelands, as his donor network announced it will curb its activities across the EU from 2024.

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