News headlines in February 2012, page 16

With climate change advancing to the forefront of the most urgent issues facing the islands of the Caribbean, young people — who arguably have the most to gain and lose in future scenarios — are becoming increasingly engaged in charting a path to environmental sustainability.

'What on earth is happening to Spain?' asks Hernán Bocchio, a 43-year-old Argentine architect with three children who has been unemployed for four years and is considering a job offer from Brazil.

Behind closed doors, a trade deal affecting a fifth of the world’s population has been quietly in the works for years.

Syrian troops have shelled the central city of Homs for a 10th day, opposition activists say, amid suggestions by the U.N.'s human rights chief that the U.N. Security Council's failure to pass a resolution condemning Syria has encouraged the government to intensify its attacks on civilians.

Drug abuse, known to be widespread among youth in India’s northern Kashmir state, is now showing a new trend whereby teenage girls and women are increasingly turning into substance abusers and addicts.

Burkina Faso's Network for Access to Essential Medicines (RAME) has called on the Burkinabè government to increase the budget allocation to the health sector to avoid interruptions to AIDS treatment.

A lack of funds and political will has blocked the setting up of environmental courts in El Salvador, which were approved by law in 1998 with the aim of addressing the serious environmental problems facing this country.

As Sudan and South Sudan meet for the latest round of negotiations featuring oil as a key issue this week, four ships loaded by Khartoum with southern crude are carrying their disputed cargoes to unknown buyers.

Last weekend saw tens of thousands of people across Europe taking to the streets in protest against the international treaty to enforce intellectual property rights. European politicians are gradually distancing themselves from the treaty, largely as a result of citizen mobilisation initiated in Central Europe.

An escalating number of unprecedented self-immolations and violent protests that have gripped Tibetan regions of Western China over recent weeks show no sign of abating, as the country reels from the worst Tibet crisis since the 2008 riots.