African leaders should be more serious about protecting the continent’s children from AIDS and it is time for them to change state spending priorities, Nelson Mandela’s wife Graca Machel said on Thursday. “No matter how small our budgets, we must do something. We will not get there (HIV reduction) with African leaders who don’t get moved by people dying,” she said during her launch of the Campaign to End Paediatric HIV/AIDS (CEPA). Sub-Saharan Africa is home to 60 percent of people living with HIV/AIDS and 1.8 million of the 2 million children globally infected, a reality Machel said should jolt African leaders into action.
Malawi prepares law on sex worker protections
Malawi is preparing a law to protect sex workers against abuse by clients in a move that could help fight HIV/AIDS which has ravaged the southern African nation in the last two decades, a minister said on Thursday. AIDS in Malawi, whose population is around 13 million, has killed over 800,000 people since it was first reported in 1985, leaving more than one million orphans.
Vast majority of countries failing to pay UN dues
Only 22 of 192 countries belonging to the United Nations have paid their dues in full, leaving the world body with a $3.1 billion deficit for the 2008-2009 budget period, said Angela Kane, the UN undersecretary-general for management. Austria, Canada, Niger, the Philippines and South Africa are among the countries that have made their full contribution.
Afghan drug supply devastating to world
Afghanistan’s abundant production of heroin and opium supply 15 million addicts worldwide and kills 100,000 people a year, according to a United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime report. The trade, worth an estimated $65 billion annually, is a main revenue stream for the Taliban.
Kidman testifies on violence against women, girls
Hollywood actress Nicole Kidman appeared before U.S. lawmakers to call for a comprehensive approach to widespread violence against women and girls that constitutes “perhaps the most systematic, widespread human-rights violation in the world.” The Australian-born actress and United Nations Development Fund for Women Goodwill Ambassador said rape during conflict, forced marriages and domestic violence recognize “no borders, no race or class.”
Pakistani schools closed after twin terror attacks
Schools and universities across Pakistan were closed for the week after a twin-suicide attack on International Islamic University that killed eight, retaliation for the Pakistani military offensive in South Waziristan near the border with Afghanistan. Militants and Pakistani military sources say the offensive is meeting with heavy resistance.
Blood diamonds headed back to market?The Kimberly Process certification scheme set up to halt the trade in conflict, or blood, diamonds by the international diamond industry is faltering over a lack of accountability and follow-through, according to a report from Partnership Africa Canada. The failures, campaigners warn, have contributed to a flourishing illegal market that threatens to put conflict diamonds back on the world market.
Photographs depict real victims of Congo rapes An exhibition of photographs on view at the UN depicts women who are the victims of sexual violence in the Democratic Republic of Congo — an exhibition the organizers hope will bring visibility to the issue. The “Congo/Women” project is a follow-up to 2007’s “Darfur/Darfur,” which featured slides of the conflict in Darfur projected onto building facades — an exhibition that has traveled to more than 35 cities.