UK news archive

30.11.2005 The government and senior police officers will be taken to court by a UK human rights group unless they provide evidence they have investigated reports that CIA 'torture flights' have landed in Britain or used British airspace.

30.11.2005 One of the most widely used weedkillers in the world, atrazine, could feminise male frogs at concentrations 30 times lower than that legally allowed in US drinking water. Research also suggests widespread contamination of drinking water in the UK.

29.11.2005 Children as young as 14 are helping to sell drugs in local communities, a charity report said.
*Report on drug selling in England

25.11.2005 Religious extremism is threatening democratic institutions and freedoms in Bangladesh, and fomenting hatred and violence towards minority ethnic and faith communities, a group of mainly British MPs claimed this week as they established an international civil society network to monitor the country's progress towards compliance with international human rights standards.

24.11.2005 The London Climate March on Saturday 3 December will be many times bigger than any demonstration on the issue so far, say organisers, and will be part of the world’s first truly global protest on climate change as demonstrations and events around the world take place in more than 30 countries.

23.11.2005 The UK government has announced a new agreement with publishers to implement new recycling targets for the industry. Under the new standards, 50% of magazines will be recycled by 2007, rising to 70% by 2013.

22.11.2005 A coalition of children’s charities has published a report charging the Government with failing in the past year to uphold the UN treaty on children’s rights.

22.11.2005 Kimberly Clark, the makers of Andrex toilet tissue and Kleenex facial tissues, have been ranked bottom in a report assessing the impact tissue companies are having on the world's forests.

20.11.2005 Stamp Out Poverty went head-to-head with Goldman Sachs - the financial sector’s leading investment bank - over the case for a currency transaction tax to help finance development, and says it won a clear victory.

20.11.2005 Campaigns for debt relief and increased aid levels had brought results that no-one could have foreseen, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Gordon Brown, told CAFOD, but warned that pressure for global justice had to be even more powerful in the next two years to hold world leaders to their G8 promises.

18.11.2005 A blow against “one of the starkest examples of rigged rules in world trade” was claimed by the Fairtrade Foundation in London yesterday when it launched its cotton certification scheme.

17.11.2005 “Money for ID cards would be far better spent on direct operational intelligence and policing,” says leading civil rights group, as Lords prepares for the report stage of the Government’s controversial ID Card Bill.

17.11.2005 The livelihoods of millions of the world's poorest people are at risk from new trade rules, a report from leading environmental group reveals.

16.11.2005 Campaigners accuse Tony Blair of going back on his trade pledge made in the 2005 election manifesto - and of wrecking any chance of a pro-poor outcome from the upcoming world trade talks.

16.11.2005 In the week when the House of Commons was shown to be spending over £11,000 on bottled water last year - water that would have cost only £25 out of the tap - experts have questioned the quality, labelling, advertising and environmental cost of the bottled stuff.

16.11.2005 Companies in the UK FTSE 100 list are saying they are committed to fighting climate change but are failing to take real action, according to a new report.

15.11.2005 ActionAid UK has issued a warning over a hoax email which tells people the charity has awarded them £850,000 to help social and business development in their community.

14.11.2005 Leading NGOs have written to Tony Blair urging him not to undermine the Kyoto Protocol or retreat from a target-based approach to cutting greenhouse gas emissions.

11.11.2005 Edinburgh-based singer/songwriter John Keenan has recorded a single on behalf of World Vision, in order to raise money for children affected by HIV/Aids.

10.11.2005 Christian Aid has invited Tory leadership contender David Cameron to a meeting, following his attack on one of the agency’s trade justice campaign posters as fostering "hostility to capitalism".