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Image: Model of the V&A Dundee, Kurtis Garbutt (Flickr)

What If… We Could Build Trust in Northeast Asia

Viewpoint by Hugh Miall

This article was issued by Toda Peace Institute and is being republished with their permission.

KENT | United Kingdom (IDN) — The new V&A Museum, designed by the Japanese architect Kengo Kuma, opened in Dundee, Scotland in 2018. ‘What If’…’ is one of its opening exhibitions.

A Scottish architectural practice brought together 25 citizens from run-down towns in Scotland. The citizens were asked what changes could make their lives better ‘if only’ things were different.

: Opinion Editor; OPINION; 27 October 2021

Photo: A decade on, the so-called Arab Spring revolts in Libya have brought carnage rather than the longed-for freedom and progress: Source: France24

Need to Learn Lessons from NATO Overthrowing Libya’s Gadhafi

Viewpoint by Jonathan Power

LUND, Sweden (IDN) — It’s 10 years since NATO hammered defenceless Libya and French jets drove the mercurial President Muammer Gadhafi into a drainage tunnel where members of a mob killed him. President Barack Obama, who had preached again and again of his abhorrence for any more military interventions, reversed himself, arguing that this intervention was necessary for humanitarian reasons since Gadhafi’s forces were mercilessly supressing an uprising.

: Jonathan Power; OPINION; 26 October 2021

Photo: Manzini nurses picketing against Police brutality and delivering their petition at Manzini regional police headquarters on October 26. Source: Swazi News

Protests for Wage Hikes and Back Pay Around the Continent

By Lisa Vives, Global Information Network

NEW YORK (IDN) — As American workers are demanding raises after years of stagnant wages, African workers are also seeking salary hikes, back pay and other benefits in a phenomenon dubbed "Striketober".

The official African response, however, has been anything but responsive. In Swaziland—renamed Eswatini, the home of Africa's last absolute monarchy—striking nurses and paramedics were met with a hail of bullets for demanding better pay at three hospitals. A spokesman for the government denied that security forces had used live ammunition or shot at strikers.

: Global Information Network; THE WORLD; Africa; 26 October 2021

Somali Love Story Sweeps Contest for Top African Film Prize

By Lisa Vives, Global Information Network

NEW YORK (IDN) — A Finnish-Somali filmmaker has scooped the grand prize at the Pan-African film festival known as FESPACO in Burkina Faso. The head of the prize jury called the winning feature a courageous film.

Director Khadar Ahmed’s film, The Gravedigger’s Wife, explores what people will do for love. It focuses on Guled, whose job it is to wait outside the hospital to bury the dead, and what he does to save his sick wife.

: Global Information Network; THE WORLD; Africa; 25 October 2021

Photo credit: Thomson Reuters Foundation

Ugandan Environmentalists Jailed for Opposing 900 Mile Oil Pipeline

By Lisa Vives, Global Information Network

NEW YORK (IDN) — Mere hours before the opening of the UN Climate Change Conference, a major environmental confab, drawing world leaders including U.S. President Joe Biden, Uganda has arrested six activists who are challenging a $3.5 billion oil pipeline project that stretches 900 miles through two East African nations, shipping crude from fields in western Uganda to international markets.

: Global Information Network; SUSTAINABILITY; Climate Action; 25 October 2021

Photo: Food being unloaded from a truck at a WFP distribution site in Zelazle in the north of Tigray. © WFP/Claire Nevill

UN Concerned for the Safety of Staff Working on the Ground in Tigray

By Radwan Jakeem

NEW YORK (IDN) — UN has "serious concerns" for the safety of staff working on the ground in Ethiopia's Tigray region. A UN humanitarian aid flight destined for the capital of the Tigray region in northern Ethiopia, was forced to return to Addis Ababa due to airstrikes on October 22, the UN’s Emergency Relief Coordinator said in a statement.

: Radwan Jakeem; SUSTAINABILITY; Food security, nutrition & sustainable agriculture; 24 October 2021

Why Finance in Common's Big Promises Should be Seen with Caution: Examples from Brazil

By Iara Pietricovsky & Livi Gerbase

Iara Pietricovskyis, current President of FORUS - International Forum of NGO Platforms and co-director OF INESC - Institute of Socioeconomic Studies, at the Brazilian NGO Association (Abong). She has represented the institution in international fora, especially the socio-environmental and indigenous areas, and has a degree in Social Sciences, specializing in Anthropology. Livi Gerbase is the policy adviser for the Brazilian Institute for Socioeconomic Studies - INESC, working in the area of public budgeting, tax justice and monitoring of international financial institutions. She holds a master's degree in International Political Economy from Federal University of Rio de Janeiro.

: Europe Editor; SUSTAINABILITY; Global Partnerships; 24 October 2021

Photo: WTO DG Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala meets with India’s Prime Minister, Narendra Modi, in New Delhi.

WTO Chief Welcomes India's Pledge of Support for the Global Trade Organization

By Jamshed Baruah

GENEVA (IDN) — World Trade Organization (WTO) Director-General Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala has applauded India's pledge of support for the WTO and a successful 12th Ministerial Conference (MC12) that will take place from November 30 to December 3, 2021, in Geneva. The gathering was originally scheduled to take place from June 8 to June 11, 2020, in Kazakhstan's capital, Nur-Sultan, but was postponed due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

: Jamshed Baruah; THE WORLD; South Asia; 23 October 2021

Photo: The President of the Caribbean Development Bank (CDB), Dr. Gene Leon. Source: Caricom Today.

Sustainable Energy Transition Vital for Caribbean Development

By J C Suresh

TORONTO | GEORGETOWN (IDN) — The President of the Caribbean Development Bank (CDB), Dr. Gene Leon, has cited the transition to sustainable energy a critical imperative for regional development, according to Caricom Today.

"Our development in the region must be seen from a holistic perspective and, perhaps more than anywhere else in the world, a sustainable energy transition is one of our most important trans-generational obligations," said Dr Leon at the Turks and Caicos Energy Forum in Providenciales, Turks and Caicos Islands, on October 21.

: J C Suresh; SUSTAINABILITY; Affordable Clean Energy; 23 October 2021

Nations Protecting "Greedy" Pharma Companies Threaten Global COVID-19 Recovery

By Kalinga Seneviratne

SYDNEY (IDN) — The European Union (EU), United Kingdom, Japan and Australia are holding the world hostage by refusing to support a waiver of COVID-19 vaccine patents for the world to recover from the pandemic. The World Trade Organization (WTO) remains at an impasse for one year.