News headlines in March 2014, page 8

KABUL, Mar 16 (IPS) - As Afghanistan heads for presidential elections Apr. 5, people are asking if the country's massive legacy of human rights violations will be swept under the carpet yet again by the new government.

LA IGUALA, Honduras, Mar 15 (IPS) - Discovery and destruction of an elaborate greenhouse for growing opium poppy and marijuana on a western hill, La Cumbre, has alerted the Honduran authorities to the fact that this is no longer just a transit country for illicit drugs, but also a producer and processor.

KIEV, Mar 15 (IPS) - Amidst rising tensions within Ukraine, between its government and Russia, and even more between Russia and the West, many are now beginning to fear the beginning of a new Cold War. Talk of sanctions is finding new supporters, and there are proposals to freeze plans for a G8 summit scheduled in Russia later this year.

WASHINGTON, Mar 15 (IPS) - Despite pressure from the Barack Obama administration, Ukraine's new prime minister, and a veritable who's who in Washington's foreign policy and financial establishment, Congress adjourned Friday for a 10-day recess without approving emergency assistance for an increasingly beleaguered and economically bereft Ukraine.

GENEVA, Mar 14 (IPS) - Following the release Friday of his report to the Human Rights Council on the situation in Iran, U.N. Special Rapporteur Ahmed Shaheed urged Tehran to engage with U.N. mandates - firstly by permitting him to enter the country.

UNITED NATIONS, Mar 14 (IPS) - The U.S.-Russian confrontation over Ukraine, which is threatening to undermine current bilateral talks on North Korea, Iran, Syria and Palestine, is also in danger of triggering a nuclear fallout.

BOUWER, Argentina, Mar 14 (IPS) - While the magnificent samba schools of Brazil were getting ready for the grand carnival in Rio de Janeiro, a modest carnival troupe toured a small Argentine town to draw attention to an urban problem that has brought the central province of Córdoba to the brink of environmental disaster: garbage.

SPOKANE, Washington, Mar 14 (IPS) - Beth Collins recently picked up and moved from Virginia to Colorado, but it wasn't for the typical reasons: new job, better schools, nicer weather. Collins' 14-year-old daughter, Jennifer, has intractable epilepsy. Medical cannibis eases her frequent seizures. But it's illegal in their home state.

BULAWAYO, Mar 14 (IPS) - She is only 17, but each morning is a reminder of her losses in life. As Pretty Nyathi* forces herself out of bed, feeds her baby, bundles him on her back and rushes to the market to buy vegetables to sell on the streets of Bulawayo, Zimbabwe she wishes her life were different.

KIEV, Mar 14 (IPS) - Crimea is facing a violent wave of human rights abuses, activists warn, with kidnappings of journalists and rights campaigners, harassment of non-Russian minorities and reports of growing persecution of anyone thought to be sympathising with the pro-European Kiev government.