News headlines in January 2009, page 6

In a country where the culture encourages people to bow, worship and even grovel before authority, Giles Ungpakorn has always been an exception.

After a 12-hour meeting behind closed doors, Southern African Development Community leaders emerged early on Jan. 27 to announce that Mugabe and Tsvangirai will form a unity government.

A fire which razed a slum settlement and killed 40 of its residents earlier this month has brought to the fore the deplorable conditions in which half of the 12 million people of this port city live - and official indifference to their plight.

Gaza will need years to recover from the devastating Israeli assault, says Katharina Ritz, head of mission of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC). Israel's 22-day assault left more than 1,300 Palestinians dead, and decimated much of the coastal territory's infrastructure.

The civilian nuclear deal between the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and the United States may fulfill the former’s long-term desire to develop alternative energy sources and the latter’s intention to promote a model for peaceful nuclear energy that sends a hint to Iran.

Despite declarations of Arab unity at a recent economic summit, Egyptian commentators say that fundamental differences between rival Arab camps - especially over the issue of Palestine - are far from over.

Environmental activists have hailed the first moves by U.S. President Barack Obama to reduce the country's greenhouse gas emissions by setting tough new fuel efficiency and pollution standards for the country's cars and trucks, steps that his predecessor, George W. Bush, had rejected or ignored.

Portuguese sociologist Boaventura de Sousa Santos argues that community radio and alternative media are the only platforms that can compete with corporate media. In an interview with TerraViva’s Alejandro Kirk, de Sousa Santos stressed that the current crisis requires that participants at the World Social Forum (WSF) take a unified political stance.

The World Social Forum meeting this week in this city in Brazil’s Amazon jungle region has an urgent and crucial task: coming up with alternative solutions for the global crisis of capitalism now under way, and pushing for democratic control of the economy and state worldwide, Filipino academic, author and activist Walden Bello tells TerraViva editor Alejandro Kirk in this interview.

NGOs like Dignity International are packing their bags to fly to Belem in Brazil where the World Social Forum (WSF) is taking place this year. The stakes are high.