News headlines in 2019, page 21

NEW YORK, Oct 23 (IPS) - In a landmark report that reinforces legal standards to combat online hate, the UN's monitor for freedom of expression calls on governments and companies to move away from standardless policies and inconsistent enforcement, and to align their laws and practices against ‘hate speech' with international human rights law.

The prevalence of online hate poses challenges to everyone, first and foremost the marginalised individuals who are its principal targets. Unfortunately, States and companies are failing to prevent ‘hate speech' from becoming the next ‘fake news', an ambiguous and politicised term subject to governmental abuse and company discretion.

WASHINGTON DC, Oct 23 (IPS) - New information published in the Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report shows that action taken by just 11 countries – most of them low- or middle-income – has resulted in 20 million fewer adult tobacco users in 2017 compared with 2008. Seventy percent of the world's tobacco users live in low- and middle-income countries.

UNITED NATIONS, Oct 23 (IPS) - States and companies are "failing" when it comes to combating online hate, the UN independent rights expert, or Special Rapporteur, on freedom of speech and expression said ahead of the launch of a landmark report to reinforce legal standards for internet spaces.

UNITED NATIONS, Oct 22 (IPS) - Sub-Saharan African migrants who risk perilous sea crossings to Europe are often assumed to be illiterate, jobless chancers in desperate bids to flee stagnation and rampant corruption in their home countries. But a survey of some 2,000 irregular African migrants in Europe found them to be more educated than expected, while many of them were leaving behind jobs back home that paid better-than-average wages.

BRUSSELS, Oct 22 (IPS) - The number of newly elected Members of the European Parliament (MEPs) who oppose women's reproductive rights, gender equality, sexuality education, same sex marriage and the Council of Europe Convention on Violence Against Women (Istanbul Convention) stands at around 30 per cent.

KUALA LUMPUR and SYDNEY, Oct 22 (IPS) - Public or state development banking will be vital to achieving the Sustainable Development Goals, argues UNCTAD's Trade and Development Report 2019 (TDR 2019).

Ongoing World Bank led efforts seek to leverage private finance via shadow banking by using public money to guarantee handsome returns managed by giant investment houses. Such financialization introduce new costs and risks to financing investments for sustainable development, decent work and renewable energy.

GENEVA, Oct 22 (IPS) - In June 2019, the Secretary-General of the UN, António Guterres, launched the UN Strategy and Plan of Action on Hate Speech. Respect for human rights, without any form of discrimination is one of the core fundamentals of this strategy.

SANTA CATALINA/SUSQUES, Argentina, Oct 22 (IPS) - "On moonless nights it was very difficult to walk around this town," says Celia Vilte, a teacher from San Francisco, a highlands village of just 54 people in the extreme northwest of Argentina whose centre is not a town square but 40 solar panels, which provide one hundred percent of its electricity.

NEW YORK, Oct 21 (IPS) - Four years ago, UN member states proclaimed their ambitions for development in a document named "Transforming Our World", also known as Agenda 2030.

Today, according to several assessments including of the UN's inter-agency task force on financing for development (FfD) transformation has fallen off-track. It has received too little money, political commitment and action to change the workings of the global economy. Agenda 2030 spells out the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) needed to ‘transform our world'.

VIENNA, Oct 21 (IPS) - IPS Correspondent Ed Holt speaks to PAULINE ADES-MEVEL, Head of European Union & Balkan desk at RS.

Rising populism, anti-media rhetoric from politicians, cyber-harassment of journalists and physical attacks are among the reasons why press freedom in Europe is on the decline, according to the global media watchdog Reporters Without Borders (RSF).