News headlines in September 2015, page 2

ROME, Sep 29 (IPS) - Over three quarters of the extreme poor in the world live in the countryside. Reducing rural poverty will therefore require significantly higher rural incomes. Since most rural incomes are related to agriculture, raising agricultural productivity can help raise rural incomes all round.

COLOMBO, SRI LANKA, Sep 29 (IPS) - As it celebrates its 70th birthday, a proud achievement of the United Nations over its lifetime, is the framework of multilateral treaties that it has been instrumental in putting in place.

OXFORD, Sep 29 (IPS) - Although some regional countries initially opposed the nuclear deal between Iran and the P5+1 (the United States, Russia, China, United Kingdom, France and Germany), once the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) was signed by the two sides in July 2015, practically all regional countries welcomed it. After the initial agreement in Lausanne, U.S. President Barack Obama invited all the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) leaders to a Camp David summit in May and all of them expressed support for the deal.

UNITED NATIONS, Sep 28 (IPS) - Speaking at the opening session of the high-level debate of the U.N. General Assembly Monday, Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said a politically troubled world is suffering from a lack of empathy.

NEW DELHI, Sep 28 (IPS) - Women account for less than half of India's population but their participation in the workforce is way below that of men. They account for 27 per cent of the workforce. If – and it is a big if – their number were to increase to the same level as men in the workforce, the country's output of good and services would expand by 27 per cent, argues Christine Lagarde, managing director of the Internatgional Monetary Fund.

ABU DHABI, Sep 28 (IPS) - (WAM) - A new report from a human rights group operating in Yemen says that human rights violations have reached unprecedented levels, with more than 3,000 people murdered by the insurgent Houthi militia and its allies in Yemen.

KATHMANDU, NEPAL, Sep 28 (IPS) - After a decade of violent insurgency, followed by another decade of chaotic transition, Nepal promulgated its new constitution on Sept. 20, 2015. Immediately afterwards, the U.N. issued a rather terse statement attributed to Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon that merely "acknowledged" the adoption of the constitution, without any congratulatory warmth.

MEXICO CITY, Sep 28 (IPS) - The Mexican government has increasingly turned to public–private partnerships (PPPs) to build infrastructure in the energy industry and other areas. But critics say this system operates under a cloak of opacity and is plagued by the discretional use of funds.

UN0ITED NATIONS, Sep 28 (IPS) - The U.N.'s much-ballyhooed Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), unanimously adopted by over 150 world leaders at a three-day summit meeting, which concluded Sep. 27, has been touted as the biggest single contribution to humanity since the invention of sliced bread.

OXFORD, Sep 26 (IPS) - Relations between Iran and Israel go back almost to the foundation of the State of Israel in 1948. Iran was the second Muslim-majority country to recognize Israel as a sovereign state, following Turkey, and the two countries had very close diplomatic and even military cooperation for many decades.