NEW YORK, Dec 16 2016 (IPS) – The Bring Back Our Girls Campaign has experienced some successes but must now overcome the challenge of hope fatigue, Bring Back Our Girls campaign co-founder Saudatu Mahdi told IPS in a recent interview.
Bring Back Our Girls campaign co-founder Saudatu Mahdi with Gloria Steinem and Jane Fonda. Credit: Donor Direct Action.
“There is the challenge of hope fatigue, especially when the expected timelines are not achieved and financial streams are low…however, the campaign remains faithful in its advocacy,”Mahdi told IPS.
19 December 2016 – TRANSCEND Media Service – A President-Elect of the USA saying he wants no more intelligence briefings is like–like what? Hearing a priest about to be ordained saying he needs no more, not Bible readings, words from God?
Johan Galtung
Whatever this “intelligence” may be is it intelligent?
Information about the “capability, intention and circumstances” of foreign (CIA) and domestic (FBI) actors: nothing wrong about that.
With a good balance between friendly and hostile intentions; 80-20? It sounds more like 1-99, though. Outer and inner worlds are scanned for threats of violence, not for opportunities of peace.
The focus is on security, not building cooperation. That may be done by conventional diplomacy–where does Trump stand on that? The US “intelligence community”–19 big organizations–looms higher.
To disregard threats damage a top politician more than to disregard opportunities.
Amid growing tensions and increasing despair among South Sudan’s population, United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon on 19 December 2016 warned that the international community’s failure to act now could put the country on a trajectory towards mass atrocities.
Two refugee children who have arrived in Democratic Republic of the Congo with a group of more than 400 other refugees from the region around Yei in South Sudan. Photo: UNHCR/Andreas Kerchief
“It is time to put the people of South Sudan, and not its leaders, at the forefront of any strategy,” Ban told the Security Council in a briefing that also featured UN Emergency Relief Coordinator Stephen O’Brien.
20 December 2016 (RT)* – The assassination of the Russian ambassador in Turkey looks like a jihadist retribution for losses in Syria, but it might have a deeper motivation, such as damaging Russia-Turkey relations or taking terrorism to a whole new level, political analysts and experts told RT.
Russian ambassador Andrey Karlov, 62, was fatally shot in the Turkish capital of Ankara while delivering a speech at an art gallery on Monday. The man who assassinated the Russian diplomat was identified as a 22-year-old officer with the Turkish riot police.
“If you care about the poorest, you care about agriculture.”— Bill Gates
19 December 2016 – TRANSCEND Media Service– The naked and cruel truth about India is that agriculture remains its Achilles’ heel. It is a source of livelihood for hundreds of millions of people but a fraction of the nation’s total economy and a symbol of its perennial distress.
Though India has the second largest agricultural land area in the world, hardly two fifth or forty percent of the agricultural land is irrigated. Also, even though the country boasts of being the highest producer of many major agricultural commodities in the world, it suffers from low productivity.
The average size of holdings for all operational classes (small & marginal, medium and large) have declined over the years and for all classes put together it has come down to 1.2 in 2010-11 from 2.3 hectare in 1970-71. No more than 4.9% of farmers control 32% of India’s farmland. A “large” farmer in India has 45 times more land than the “marginal” farmer
19 December 2016 – TRANSCEND Media Service – In 2016, Winter in the Northern hemisphere begins on Wed, 21 Dec, 10:44 a.m.GMT–shortest day of the year.
Awe and Reverence in Day and Night
For thousands of years, humans sought to understand the cosmic wonders they witnessed each day and night, endless cycles. But what if the cycle would cease? What was the mystery of rising and setting sun and moon? Unstoppable! Perhaps!
18 December 2016 (UNEP)*– Governments agreed on actions that will accelerate implementation of global biodiversity targets, and enhance the linkage of the biodiversity agenda with other global agendas including the Sustainable Development Goals, the Paris Climate Agreement and others.
PHOTO: UNEP
Governments from 167 countries agreed on a variety of measures that will intensify the implementation of the Aichi Biodiversity Targets, including mainstreaming, capacity-development and mobilization of financial resources as well as actions on specific themes including protected areas, ecosystem restoration, sustainable wildlife management and others.
19 December 2016 – Countries attending the United Nations Biodiversity Conference in Mexico reached agreements on actions to integrate biodiversity in forestry, fisheries, agriculture, and tourism sectors and to achieve the 2030 Agenda on Sustainable Development.
Butterflies in Mexico. Photo: World Bank/Curt Carnemark | Source: UN News centre
The 13th Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), also known as COP 13 saw governments from 167 countries agree upon a range of measures that are expected to accelerate the implementation of the Aichi Biodiversity Targets by 2020, as well as generate action for protected areas, ecosystem restoration, sustainable wildlife management, and a range of other themes.
December 18th, 2016 (TFF–Transnational Foundation for Peace and Future Research)In spring 2011 I was invited by then Danish foreign minister, Villy Søvndal, to be a keynote speaker at a conference in Copenhagen arranged by the ministry and the Danish Institute for International Studies (DIIS) with experts, then UN mediator Kofi Annan’s adviser, scholars, diplomats and, most importantly, a number of Syrian (opposition) politicians and civil society representatives.
The minister left the conference when he had opened it and, like most politicians today, obviously did not give priority to listen to the input of this high-level group present in the conference room.
