Full Coverage: Development

28.04.2006 The National Rural Employment Guarantee Act has run into a roadblock with the Centre deciding to cut down the minimum wages.A few days ago, after analysing the average payments to workers employed under the EGA, the Centre decided to fix a uniform wage rate of Rs 60.

28.04.2006 King Gyanendra reinstated the assembly on 24 April in a bid to end almost three weeks of nationwide protests in which at least 14 people died. But the swearing-in ceremony for newly appointed Prime Minister Girija Prasad Koirala was delayed due to ill health.

28.04.2006 At least half a billion people in developing Asia are unemployed or underemployed and finding ways to provide them productive jobs should top economic agendas around the region, according to an ADB book.

28.04.2006 he young man who studied engineering at the University of Benin is from the Fantsuam Foundation [1], an APC affiliated non-profit founded in 1996 in the city of Jos, Nigeria. From the outset, it was known that his group planed the development of a unique computer that could fight the heat, dust and take on the challenging power situation of rural Africa [2]. But Onoberhie reveals details around the ‘Solo’.

28.04.2006 The IAEN is announcing its “Call for Papers”. This Call is open to individuals conducting research on the issue of HIV/AIDS and economics. Accepted papers will be presented during a 2-day Symposium in Toronto on 11-12 August, 2006 (immediately prior to the XVI International AIDS Conference). Selected researchers will receive travel, per diem, lodging and scholarship to attend the preconference and the subsequent conference. Highest priority will be given to researchers from developing countries.

28.04.2006 A recent spate of attacks in South Darfur State seems to constitute a new military offensive by the Sudanese government and puts the lives of tens of thousands of people at risk, regional analysts have warned.

28.04.2006 A soldier was injured during heavy fighting between Kenyan and Ethiopian forces in Moyale District, northern Kenya, after about 60 Ethiopian soldiers crossed the border in pursuit of suspected Oromo Liberation Front rebels. Drought has made historic border tensions even worse, with constant cross-border raids and stock theft.

27.04.2006 The United States Wednesday vowed to organise an international pressure campaign against the LTTE in the aftermath suicide bombing in Colombo. Assistant Secretary of State Richard Boucher said the State Department was in touch in Washington and abroad with other countries "to bring to bear whatever pressure we can on the Tigers to abandon this course of action" and to look for ways to support the Government of Sri Lanka.

27.04.2006 Thousands of people have fled their homes in north-eastern Sri Lanka as the military launched fresh air strikes on Tamil Tiger targets. Local officials said about 40,000 people were moving north to seek safety in the jungle.

27.04.2006 Children in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) continue to endure some of the most inhumane treatment found anywhere in the world, despite outward signs of progress, according to a new report by the Watchlist on Children and Armed Conflict.

26.04.2006 Following King Gyanendra's humiliating late-night climbdown , in which he agreed to reinstate Parliament, hundreds of thousands of people from all walks of life descended on the Nepalese capital to stake their claim to the political future of the country.

26.04.2006 With stress levels among people on the rise and tempers flaring up easily, it is time for 'peace education' in schools and the NCERT is all set to train teachers in conflict resolution techniques and ways to undermine violence and aggression.

26.04.2006 Even as the number of out-of-school children has been brought down to 13.5m over the last four years from a high of 25m, the issue of quality of education still remains to be tackled in its entirety.

26.04.2006 The Global Action Week under the global campaign for education in the state kicked off with these astounding figures and quite understandably, the topic of the week begining April 24, this year is ‘Every child needs a teacher’.

26.04.2006 DASA facilitates an exchange programme for African researchers through its Centre for Governance in Africa Programme, in conjunction with Fredskopset, the Norwegian Volunteer Service. The objective of this particular programme is to expose young professionals working in the area of governance to political processes in other African countries, and to develop a framework for collaboration around African based democracy and governance centers.

26.04.2006 A number of activists, demonstrating in support of judges currently under fire for demanding judicial reform, were arrested and beaten on Monday in Egypt, according to local human rights groups

26.04.2006 Sitting on thin foam mattresses sprawled across a crude cement floor in drought-stricken northern Kenya, dozens of mothers nurse emaciated babies as flies hover around mosquito netting.The odours of medicine and sweat mixed with the stench of disease hang in the foetid air under the iron roof of this hospital annex. Set up to take in overflow from the packed paediatric ward, it too is filled with infants howling and batting futilely at feeding tubes in their nostrils.

These are the latest victims of a drought that has put more than 11-million people across East Africa at risk of starvation, 3,5-million of them in Kenya, where recent heavy rains have exacerbated already dire conditions.

25.04.2006 Encouraged by the rapid strides in the Information Technology sector, the Andhra Pradesh State Government is chalking out plans to introduce computer education in 10,000 zilla parishad and Government high schools.

25.04.2006 In a rare interview, sub-Saharan Africa’s last absolute monarch King Mswati of Swaziland said this week his country is not ready for political parties and criticised foreign governments for meddling in its internal affairs

25.04.2006 One in 10 people who take anti-retrovirals will experience difficulties with the medication or their bodies will reject it completely. This was heard in Cape Town on Tuesday at Microbicides 2006, the first international conference held in Africa into research into gels that could prevent HIV transmission in women.