There are 191 articles

  • Afghan NGO rejects German defense, 70 civilians killed in NATO strike

    Scores of civilians died in last week's NATO air strike on populated area in northern Afghanistan, a prominent domestic rights group said on Monday in a first independent estimate of the death toll. Afghanistan Rights Monitor (ARM), a non-governmental group funded by domestic rights campaigners, said in a report based on more than a dozen interviews.. More

  • Mexico struggling to find source of killer flu

    Mexico first noticed a strange new flu virus after a woman died in the southern state of Oaxaca on April 13, but investigators are far from discovering the origin of an outbreak that has spread throughout the world. Possible cases of the new PN1 swine flu have been found in several locations in Mexico hundreds of miles apart from as early as mid-March,.. More

  • 'Mega-droughts' forecast for Africa

    Severe droughts could devastate sub-Saharan Africa following a recent decades-long drought that killed 100,000 people in Africa's Sahel region, scientists say. Sub-Saharan Africa often suffers droughts, but the group of specialists reported on Thursday that global climate change will make these dry periods more severe and more difficult for the people.. More

  • Afghan quake survivors struggling without aid

    Survivors of a strong quake in a remote corner of eastern Afghanistan say they spent a freezing night in the rain outside the collapsed remains of their homes because promised government help did not reach them. Two strong quakes shook an area several dozen kilometers (miles) west of the city of Jalalabad on Thursday night, killing at least 19 and.. More

  • Israeli army faces fresh criticism

    Israel's army violated codes of ethics and international law during the war in Gaza by attacking medics and refusing to allow the treatment of wounded, a human-rights group says. In a report published on Monday, the group Physicians for Human Rights (PHR) calls for an independent body to investigate the military's conduct during its 22-day war on Gaza,.. More

  • Afghans fear spiral of violence

    Sitting in a room warmed by woodfire because there is no electricity, Jamshid Hashimi, a young employee of a local architecture firm, watches from his window as Kabul residents hurry to avoid the rain which has turned unpaved streets into mud. "More troops will mean more fighting," he says. Afghan analysts agree that the expected arrival.. More

  • Iraqi justice system falls short

    Iraq is failing to give prisoners fair trials and abuse of prisoners appears common ahead of the transfer of thousands of detainees from U.S. prison camps to Iraqi control, a human rights group said on Monday. Human Rights Watch said prisoners had to wait months and in some cases years before being brought before a judge. They also received ineffectual.. More

  • Middle East Quartet 'is failing'

    Aid agencies have accused the Middle East Quartet of failing in its mission and urged it to increase its efforts. In a report, the agencies said the Quartet - which comprises Russia, the US, the EU and the UN - had failed to make progress on a number of fronts. The report was issued ahead of a Quartet meeting in New York on Friday. The Bush.. More

  • Cairo disaster 'could happen again'

    More than a week after a section of the Moqattam hills cracked and fell on parts of Manshiyet Nasser, Cairo's largest shantytown, experts are warning of further landslides and potential disasters. The rockslide, which government geologists estimated spanned an area 60m wide and 15m long, destroyed over 50 homes, killing 82 and leaving hundreds of people.. More

  • Jewish West Bank settlers take over more land

    Israeli authorities and settlers have seized large tracts of land in the occupied West Bank for security zones around Jewish settlements beyond an Israeli-built barrier, a human rights group said on Thursday. In a new report, the Israeli B'Tselem group said some 12 settlements east of the barrier had been fenced off under an official "Special.. More

  • Rage in Kashmir meets India's brute force

    The world's largest democracy locks up protest leaders without charge, shoots dozens of demonstrators dead, beats and intimidates ordinary citizens and raids homes without warrants. Welcome to Indian Kashmir, where the biggest separatist protests in two decades have clashed with the might of the state. "They are ruthless, trigger happy,".. More

  • UN warns of Ethiopia food crisis

    The UN's senior aid official has called for greater international efforts to help millions of Ethiopians suffering from a severe drought. About eight million people need urgent food relief and another 4.6 million need emergency assistance, according to the UN's Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA (. John Holmes, the UN's undersecretary.. More

  • Peace activist boats sail into Gaza sand

    Forty-four activists who set sail from Cyprus in the hope of breaking Israel’s siege of the Gaza Strip are now safe on Gazan sand. “We have shown the world what people can do when they come together. We have shown the Israeli authorities that we will not tolerate their illegal siege of Gaza. We have shown the Palestinian people that activists.. More

  • Georgia's crucial 'energy corridor'

    In two short weeks, Georgia has redefined the relationship between Russia and the West and created a vastly different global dynamic. For many people, this war was never really just about territory or ideology, it was about influence over a vital energy corridor to the West. Georgia is home to one of the world's most important pieces of infrastructure,.. More

  • Truce barely eases Gaza embargo

    For over a year, Israel has allowed little more than basic humanitarian aid into Gaza, as a means of isolating Hamas. A ceasefire between Israel and Hamas two months ago was meant to lead to the easing of restrictions, but progress has been slow, and frustration is rising. In the dank basement of one of Gaza's sewage pumping stations, raw sewage.. More