Frank Phiri
BLANTYRE, Feb 9 2006 (IPS) – When police announced recently that they had detained a man in the northern town of Karonga for allegedly killing his wife after she refused him sex, there were hopes that the arrest would send a stern warning to other husbands with violent inclinations.
Apparently, it didn t.
Within a week of the Karonga murder, two other husbands attempted to kill their wives: one by chopping off both arms of the spouse, the other by petrol-bombing his wife.
Shortly after that, a woman and her one-month-old baby were found in a maize patch. They had allegedly been killed and mutilated by the woman s husband, before he attempted to hang himself.
Police reports indicate that last month alone, five women died at the hands of thei…
Bill Berkowitz*
OAKLAND, California, Mar 14 2006 (IPS) – On Mar. 9, during remarks at the Second White House National Conference on Faith-Based and Community Initiatives in Washington, Pres. George W. Bush recognised the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) for its work with faith-based organisations.
Bush said that USAID must continue to reach out to faith-based programmes in order to make sure that we fulfill missions around the world in a compassionate way .
According to a White House press release, last year, USAID gave 591 million dollars to faith-based organisations, second only to the Department of Health and Human Services.
In addition to the money dispersed by USAID, five years after the introduction of the administration s faith-based in…
Francesca Colombo* – Tierramérica
BOLOGNA, Apr 15 2006 (IPS) – The Italian scientist Morando Soffritti has revived the debate about the safety of aspartame, an artificial sweetener used in many popular products, including diet softdrinks made by Coca-Cola and Pepsi Co. After studying 1,800 rats over eight years, his research team concluded that aspartame could have carcinogenic effects.
The results, first released in July 2005 and published in March in the U.S. Department of Health s journal, Environmental Health Perspectives , contradict other studies financed by the company that created the sweetner, G.D. Searle Company, which assures aspartame poses no risks to human health.
For the past 25 years, the product has been authorised by the U.S. Food and Drug Administr…
Marcela Valente
BUENOS AIRES, May 16 2006 (IPS) – The Argentine capital opened its first municipal plant for classifying solid waste plastic, glass, paper, metal, cardboard and other materials for recycling, as part of a project aimed at providing decent jobs for informal garbage collectors and reducing the amount of trash dumped into landfills.
The people sorting, classifying and processing rubbish in the City Plant for the Classification and Conditioning of Recyclable Material were until recently cartoneros , the name given in Buenos Aires to those who make a meagre living picking through garbage.
The number of cartoneros skyrocketed during the severe economic crisis of late-2001 and 2002, but has shrunk somewhat as the economy recovered, to perhaps 10,000 today.
Julio Godoy
PARIS, Jun 19 2006 (IPS) – The asbestos-laden French ship Clemenceau continues to provoke controversy, after being at the heart of an international debate on how and where so-called end-of-life ships should be dismantled.
The Clemenceau, a former French military aircraft carrier, which contains some 100 tonnes of the cancer-provoking asbestos, was supposed to be broken down at a naval yard in Alang, in the western Indian state of Gujarat. From Jan. 1 to Feb. 15, the ship was towed from the French port of Toulon to the Indian Ocean, and was expected to be docked in Alang by late February.
But a legal battle between French environmental and health activists, who claimed that the disposal of the ship s asbestos could not be carried out in India without puttin…
Marcela Valente* – Tierramérica
BUENOS AIRES, Aug 4 2006 (IPS) – Argentine judicial authorities are investigating cases of uranium contamination around the Ezeiza Atomic Centre, in Buenos Aires province. A married couple who have been diagnosed with cancer have been accepted as plaintiffs in a related lawsuit.
The first complaint reached the judicial branch in 2000, when residents of the area sounded the alert about possible poisoning of the water supply with uranium, and blamed the nuclear facility for the potential health consequences for the nearby population.
All of the reports recognise that there is contamination, and all are valid. The judge will have to combine the results and reach a conclusion, biologist Raúl Montenegro, president of the independent Found…
Marwaan Macan-Markar
CHACHOENGSAO, Sep 6 2006 (IPS) – To be a duck in a modern poultry farm, that conforms to bio-safety measures against bird flu, is to be condemned to a brief, joyless life bereft of sunshine or a pond to take a dip in.
That is the fate of 80,000 ducks currently spending 42 weeks before being slaughtered for the table at the Big Duck Farm located in this province, east of Bangkok.
Visitors to this farm are sprayed with disinfectant and the workers must also shower and shampoo and wear protective clothing before going into the long, low-rise sheds covered with black fabric where the ducks are raised.
We have also begun to check the ducks every eight weeks for avian influenza, says Sompiss Jullabutradee, a consultant at the Big Duck Farm. Whe…
– ‘Summoners War’ จัดกิจกรรมฉลองการคอลแลบฯ ‘มหาเวทย์ผนึกมาร’ ในหอคอยสู่สวรรค์ถึงวันที่ 15 กันยายน
– พบกับเหล่าบอสตัวละครคอลแลบฯ และรับรางวัลต่าง ๆ รวมถึงคัมภีร์มห�…
Naoki Yoshida ผู้กำกับเกม Final Fantasy XIV ได้ออกมาชี้แจงข่าวลือที่ว่าทีมงานของเขากำลังพัฒนาเกมรีเมค Final Fantasy IX ผ่านรายการ Letter from the Producer บนช่อง YouTube ของ Final Fantasy XIV เมื่อวันที่ 14 มิถุนายนที่ผ่านมา
โดยข่าวลือดังกล่าวเกิดขึ้นจากการแปลความผิดพลาดระหว่างการทัวร์สื่อเพื่อประชาสัมพันธ์เนื้อหาเสริม Dawntrail ของ Final Fantasy XIV หลาย…
Sikiratou Ahouansou
DAKAR, Sep 26 2006 (IPS) – You can find them at the rear of the large shed in the market at the train station, amidst dust, shouts of laughter and the thwack of sacks being thrown onto pushcarts. These are some of the kaolin sellers that frequent the Senegalese capital, Dakar.
A good many people may be unfamiliar with kaolin a type of fine, crumbly clay typically used to make ceramics such as porcelain. Still fewer may be aware that kaolin is not only used for manufacturing purposes, but is also eaten in Senegal and other parts of West Africa.
Trade in the substance is dominated by vendors from neighbouring Mali, where it is mined in several regions. A sack of kaolin, weighing in at a hefty 90 to 95 kilogrammes, sells for about 14 dollars. (Over 70…