Overseas news archive

16.06.2006 The Thai government has been asked to repudiate reports that the authorities in the south have proposed large cash rewards for people who have gunfights with alleged insurgents, with top money paid for confirmed deaths.

16.06.2006 Constitutionalism has collapsed in Sri Lanka and only its restoration can halt the carnage in the country, an Asian rights group said in the wake of a landmine explosion that killed at least 60 bus passengers and retaliatory air raids.

16.06.2006 On the eve of today's controversial International Whaling Commission meeting, a poll shows that citizens from 10 countries in the Pacific and Caribbean, whose governments repeatedly vote to resume commercial whaling, do not support the hunt.
* Whales' fate hanging in the balance
* Campaigners demand governments unite against Japan's massive porpoise hunt

16.06.2006 The demolition or damage of Hindu temples in Malaysia following orders by government authorities has been condemned by a leading Asian rights group.

15.06.2006 The first day of a measles vaccination campaign in East Timor included 600 children in a camp for people displaced by recent violence.

15.06.2006 Brazil's Indians are suffering high levels of violence linked to the loss of their land, says a new report.

15.06.2006 Emergency relief plans for the Indonesian earthquake are hamstrung because of lack of funds from donors and the international community, six non-government organisations working on relief efforts said today.

15.06.2006 Up to 14 billion bullets are manufactured globally every year and there is no reliable data on how billions of them are used or to whom they are sold, says a report on the global ammunition trade released today.

15.06.2006 Iran is pressed to investigate the police beating of hundreds of women’s rights activists during a peaceful demonstration in Tehran on Monday, and to release those detained.

15.06.2006 A Greenpeace ship has been refused entry to St Kitts, where a controversial International Whaling Commission begins on Friday - a meeting the environmental lobby group says will be a disaster for whales.

15.06.2006 This year’s world grain harvest is projected to fall short of consumption by 61 million tons, marking the sixth time in the last seven years that production has failed to satisfy demand and possibly creating the lowest stocks since 1972 when prices doubled.

15.06.2006 A delegation of Nobel Peace Prize laureates is pushing for increased negotiations between Iran and the US.

15.06.2006 Oil investment is causing forced migration and violence in southern Sudan, warns a leading international refugee organisation.
* ICC finds evidence of Darfur massacres, prepares prosecution

15.06.2006 Growing evidence shows that harmful chemicals are already affecting the health of many Arctic animals, such as polar bears, beluga whales, seals and seabirds, says a new report.

15.06.2006 Researchers are developing two prototype tests to detect fake anti-malarial tablets in just five seconds, compared with more than two hours with conventional methods.

14.06.2006 At least 80 detainees at Campsfield Immigration Removal Centre near Oxford refused breakfast this morning and reports say another 40 have since joined their hunger strike: they claim they are treated like animals and that Campsfield has become a "slave house".

14.06.2006 Agricultural experts, ministers and policymakers gathered in Nigeria have called on African governments to improve access to fertilisers across the continent.

14.06.2006 The debt relief target for the world's poorest is a massive underestimate, according to research by the New Economics Foudnation, which says basic health and education needs could be met in five years if the richest nations honoured aid commitments.

14.06.2006 The complicity of European Union member states in the US-led renditions programme must be addressed at the European Summit meeting on Thursday, Amnesty said today.
* Eurasia: uphold human rights in combatting terrorism

14.06.2006 The US is pushing “free trade agreements” with Peru, Colombia and Ecuador that will harm thousands of vulnerable small farmers, block access to affordable medicines and favour foreign investors, according to a new report released today.