News headlines in 2009, page 21

Sixty-one years after the adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, sexual orientation and gender identity still pose a threat to the dignity and sovereignty of individuals around the world.

Among the thousands of people who have flocked to the Danish capital this week for the climate change summit and dozens of parallel activities are activists of all ages and stripes and representatives of the business community. TerraViva caught up to some of them to find out why they are here and what they hope to achieve.

In the darkest corner of the room, under the clamour of twelve women’s voices, sits Ghati Chacha*, she can barely be heard. Her newborn suckles as she speaks softly about how she refused female circumcision.

The sun came out in Copenhagen Saturday for the first time this week. But even though its rays were too weak to temper the bone-chilling cold, it shone brightly over the 5,000 people who braved the weather to participate in a demonstration organised by Friends of the Earth International (FOEI).

As the war on drugs moves closer to home and a new administration presents new ideas, policymakers in Washington are taking notice of 30 years' worth of ineffectual drug policy and beginning to think about different ways of addressing the northward flow of narcotics.

As delegates deliberate over the extent carbon emissions will be curbed in the closing days of the U.N. summit here, the environmental ramifications of that agreement are likely to be felt in places far removed from the negotiating table, particularly among indigenous people on the front lines of climate change.

Industrial agriculture may emit nearly half of climate-heating greenhouse gases, but that reality has gone unrecognised by negotiators at the climate treaty talks here, say farmers with La Via Campesina, an international movement of hundreds of millions of small-scale peasant farmers.

Powerful neighbour. A rising power. Old friend. Big, secretive investor. Big boy of the region. These were some of the terms participants at the just-finished Mekong Media Forum here used, when asked to share the images of China they get from the media.

Asian delegations to the ongoing global negotiations on climate change are insisting that a political agreement must be reached to pave the way for a legally binding treaty in the near future.

‘Gender’ may not exist in all of Asia’s lexicons, but the concept is not necessarily alien to the region.