Overseas news archive

05.02.2007 Ten years after international guidelines were established to stamp out the recruitment and use of child soldiers, under-age fighters are still actively being recruited in at least 13 countries, says a children's charity.

05.02.2007 The UN Population Fund renewed its call today for intensified global efforts to save the 3 million girls who still face the risk of female genital mutilation or cutting every year.

02.02.2007 It is not clear that the Bush Administration's proposed reform of the 2002 Farm Bill as a first step toward unlocking the paralysis in multilateral trade negotiations will significantly reduce export dumping or signify a meaningful shift in the US position at the WTO, a leading development group warned.

02.02.2007 The Thai government must lift the Emergency Decree which is in force over the southern provinces and which effectively legalises torture, according to an Asian rights group.

01.02.2007 An increasing number of bloggers and cyber-dissidents are in jail, with China, Vietnam, Syria, Tunisia, Libya and Iran the worst offenders for imprisoning online government critics, according to an annual press freedom survey.