News headlines in October 2010, page 7

Mexico has suffered a setback in terms of government transparency and access to public information, according to Thomas Blanton and Kate Doyle, experts with the Washington-based National Security Archive (NSA). In an interview with IPS, Blanton said that while Mexico's system of access to information is institutionally strong, and even serves as a model worldwide, government officials routinely ignore Federal Institute for Access to Public Information (IFAI) decisions, with no consequences.

The new government of Trinidad and Tobago wasted little time. In fact, Finance Minister Winston Dookeran took less than 30 seconds of a two-hour budget presentation to announce that the People's Partnership government, headed by the country's first female prime minister, Kamla Persad Bissessar, was scrapping the $66.6 million dollar smelter plant project involving investors from China and Brazil.

Civil society leaders meeting in New York last week assessed the successes and failures of the U.N. MDG Summit (20-22 Sep.) and discussed what is required for a MDG Breakthrough Plan.

The January earthquake that devastated Haiti put women and girls in the poorest country in the hemisphere at an increased risk of falling prey to people trafficking, activists and experts warn.

For the last 50 years, Jamaica's modern history has been shaped by two powerful parties - the Jamaica Labour Party and the People's National Party. Although dozens of others have periodically emerged, the political graveyard has inevitably been their final resting place. Betty Ann Blaine appears undaunted by this fact. A historian, university lecturer, children's rights advocate and talk show host, Blaine took the plunge in August, launching the New Nation Coalition (NNC). She hopes to prove the sceptics wrong and emerge victorious when Jamaicans go to the polls in the next general election, constitutionally due in 2012.

A woman took position alongside male soldiers at the graveside of a fallen colleague. She positioned her AK47 on her shoulder, and on command fired into the grey sky with the others. Mariatu Sesay became at that moment the first woman in the Sierra Leone army to take part in a 21-gun salute to honour a dead soldier.

Calls by fragile states for greater focus on addressing conflict and fragility have been largely ignored in the outcome document of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) Summit in New York, but critical donors are at least listening to the growing rumble of voices from developing nations.

Men representing an array of sexual identifications have organised in Cuba to defend sexual rights and promote respect for 'other masculinities,' with the belief that greater visibility is needed to achieve true social change and acceptance.

Judges and other judicial officers in Argentina have begun to receive training on gender equality and women's rights, as part of a broad programme that could serve as a model for similar initiatives in the rest of Latin America.

Less than two months after Pakistan was devastated by one of the worst disasters in recent history, the European Union's lawmakers have decided that Pakistanis living in the 27-country bloc without permission should be returned home.