Foreign Minister Dr Dipu Moni said on August 22 Islamic fundamentalism is a relatively new phenomenon, which has deviated from the original teachings of Islam. She said fundamentalism by definition is an extreme position. Hence, fundamentalism–be it Islamic, Hindu, Buddhist, Christian or Jewish cannot bring good in the society, he added. She was addressing at a workshop [...]

Three weeks after Pakistan’s worst natural disaster began, many people are living in camps all around the country. Shmyalla Jawad, who is the gender advisor for the Plan International organisation in Pakistan, visited some of these camps in the Layyah district in Southern Punjab. She found out that apart from the dire conditions in the [...]

Burma’s first general election for two decades will be held on 7 November, the ruling generals have announced, ending months of speculation, according to BBC News on 13th August 2010. The vote is being tightly controlled, and a new constitution reserves 25% of the new parliament for the military. The poll is the first since [...]

One day of the Iraq War = 720 million dollars One day of the Iraq War = 1,153,846 Children with Free School Lunches One day of the Iraq War = 84 New Elementary Schools One day of the Iraq War = 12,478 Elementary School Teachers One day of the Iraq War = 423,529 Children with [...]

The Karen National Union (KNU) has released a press statement “Pre-Election Military Operation by SPDC” on 27th July 2010. In the statement, it is said that SPDC (State Peace and Development Council) has started pre-election miliary operations, targeting the innocent Karen civilians in the Karen State and other KNU areas. Fifty seven houses, one Christian church, one [...]

The government calls it “sealed management.” China’s capital has started gating and locking some of its lower-income neighborhoods overnight, with police or security checking identification papers around the clock, in a throwback to an older style of control. It’s Beijing’s latest effort to reduce rising crime often blamed on the millions of rural Chinese migrating [...]

Ma Xiangqian, a 19-year-old migrant from the eastern Chinese province of Henan, worked the 11-hour night shift, seven days a week, putting together electronic parts for Foxconn Technology, the world’s biggest contract maker of information technology goods. By all accounts, he hated his job. In the month before his death in January, Ma worked 286 [...]

On May 1, 2009, while other women labourers availed their holiday after finishing their respective chores, 35-year-old Nasim spent her day travelling from her abode in Baldia Town, Karachi, to a government hospital in Saddar Town. Naseem is being treated for a respiratory disorder that she developed while working in a garment factory last year. [...]

On the 4th of May, the Triumph workers in the Philippines were violently evicted from their picket line. More than 200 security forces invaded the former factory grounds, removed the protesting workers and destroyed their action camp. Take action now to support these workers! The workers have set up another picket line further down the [...]

Thousands of women in the Irrawaddy delta, most victims of Cyclone Nargis who still face enormous hardships two years after the storm ravaged the region, have been targeted by human traffickers, according to social workers. “Many of them [young women in the Irrawaddy delta] don’t want to stay in a place that has no job [...]