News headlines in April 2013, page 21

TRIPOLI, Apr 04 (IPS) - In Libya, a dose of LSD or the painkiller tramadol costs 78 cents, and a joint of cannabis is 7.80 dollars. Here, drugs are affordable to the poor for a simple reason. "Slashing prices is a way to create demand and open up a market," a Western diplomat tells IPS in Tripoli, the capital.

WASHINGTON, Apr 03 (IPS) - Publication this month of Vali Nasr's "The Dispensable Nation: American Foreign Policy in Retreat" is well-timed.

WASHINGTON, Apr 03 (IPS) - A confluence of factors could make 2013 the most fruitful opportunity in years – and for years – for potentially major action on climate change, according to a leading voice on climate change policy, the British economist Nicholas Stern.

Apr 03 (IPS) - Environmental groups are sounding alarms about conflicting reports on the size and seriousness of an oil spill that took place late last week in the southern U.S. state of Arkansas.

Harare, Apr 03 (IPS) - The Beitbridge area in southern Zimbabwe was hit by serious flooding earlier this year. Those affected are still trying to get back on their feet.

HAVANA, Apr 03 (IPS) - Three-year-old Yanaghy García has been in the William Soler Children's Hospital, in the Cuban capital, for a month. He suffers from epilepsy, but he forgets about it all for a while and smiles at the antics of Mantequilla, a clown.

JIJIGA, Ethiopia, Apr 03 (IPS) - For over two decades Somali Region, in eastern Ethiopia, has been devastated by a grueling insurgency. Trapped in a time warp, it has been forgotten and underdeveloped. But in the last few years, thanks to the increased security here, a five-star hotel, eco-tourism ventures and even a large abattoir are being built by the former diaspora community.

WASHINGTON, Apr 03 (IPS) - With all sides seeming to climb further up the escalatory ladder over the last several days, defusing the ongoing crisis on the Korean Peninsula -- let alone persuading Pyongyang to give up its nuclear arsenal as it once promised to do -- looks daunting.

CARACAS, Apr 02 (IPS) - The São Paulo Forum, which groups leftist political parties and organisations of Latin America and the Caribbean, sees a victory by Venezuela's acting President Nicolás Maduro in the Apr. 14 elections as key to the future of the left in the region, and to "containing the right".

UNITED NATIONS, Apr 02 (IPS) - For many in the international community, the iconic sculpture outside the U.N. Visitors' Centre appears more prominent today, as the majority of member states tightened its knot by adopting the first ever Arms Trade Treaty (ATT).