News headlines in May 2014

WASHINGTON, May 31 (IPS) - Mobile-finance and direct cash grants are revolutionary tools that can substitute for under-developed financial sectors and help reduce poverty and promote entrepreneurship in developing countries, according to researchers here.

PHNOM PENH, May 31 (IPS) - The movement for reproductive justice sees women's decision to have – or not have – children as a fundamental right. Should they choose to bear a child, women should have the right to care and provide for them; if they opt not to give birth, family planning services should be made available to enable women to space or prevent pregnancies.

WASHINGTON, May 31 (IPS) - Over two billion people - or 30 percent of the world's population - are either obese or overweight, and no country has successfully reduced obesity rates to date, according to a new study published this week by the British medical journal, The Lancet.

UNITED NATIONS, May 30 (IPS) - The United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), one of the largest U.N. agencies with an estimated average annual budget of more than five billion dollars, is undergoing major structural changes - triggering large-scale staff layoffs, demotions, salary reductions and downgrading and abolition of existing senior-level jobs.

COLOMBO, May 30 (IPS) - Stuck in mid-day rush hour traffic, commuters packed tight into a tin-roofed bus in Sri Lanka's capital, Colombo, peer expectantly up at the sky that is beating a savage heat down on the city.

BEIRUT, May 30 (IPS) - Roughly three kilometres north of Beirut's Syrian embassy in Baabda, Syrians crammed in one of an endless stream of buses, exited and continued on foot. The masses opted to walk the remaining few kilometres rather than sit in a traffic jam generated by the tens of thousands flocking to vote.

KIEV, May 30 (IPS) - As Ukraine's president elect Petro Poroshenko prepares to begin his presidency, Ukrainians are hoping he will not forget that separatist violence is just one of a long list of problems he needs to help solve in the country.

ROME, May 30 (IPS) - Since 2004, the Independent Commission on Turkey (ICT) has watched closely developments within Turkey and between Turkey and the European Union (EU). On April 7 the ITC launched its third report, Turkey in Europe: The Imperative for Change.

UXBRIDGE, Canada, May 29 (IPS) - The world is increasingly hungry because small farmers are losing access to farmland. Small farmers produce most of the world's food but are now squeezed onto less than 25 percent of the world's farmland, a new report reveals. Corporate and commercial farms, big biofuel operations and land speculators are pushing millions off their land.

CAIRO, May 29 (IPS) - With a result already known before the race started, many did not even bother heading to the polling stations and the streets in Cairo were unusually empty during the election process that ended Wednesday, just like the ballot boxes.