News headlines in February 2021, page 5

GENEVA, Feb 16 (IPS) - The United Nations Committee of Experts on International Cooperation in Tax Matters (UN Tax Committee) is an important and influential subsidiary body of the Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) that shapes standards and guidelines on international taxation. These are the rules through which Multinational Enterprises (MNEs) are taxed.

KATHMANDU, Nepal, Feb 16 (IPS) - Raju Pandit Chhetri is one of the most acclaimed climate change policy experts in Nepal and South Asia. As Director of the Prakiriti Resource Centre, an action focused think tank based in Kathmandu, Pandit Cheetri shares his opinion on the latest climate focused policies being undertaken by the Government of Nepal, especially the 2nd Nationally Determined Contribution NDC that was recently submitted by the Government.

SYDNEY and KUALA LUMPUR, Feb 16 (IPS) - Vaccine developers’ refusal to share publicly funded vaccine research findings is stalling broader, affordable vaccinations which would more rapidly contain COVID-19 contagion. The pandemic had infected at least 109 million people worldwide, causing over 2.4 million deaths as of mid-February.

NEW DELHI, India, Feb 15 (IPS) - The armed conflict in Yemen which has lasted six years, has killed and injured over thousands of civiliansdisplaced more than one million people and given rise to cholera outbreaks, medicine shortages and threats of famine. By the end of 2019, it is estimated that over 233,000 Yemenies have been killed as a result of fighting and the humanitarian crisis. With nearly two-thirds of its population requiring food assistance, Yemen is also experiencing the world's worst food security crisis. The United Nations has called the humanitarian crisis in Yemen “the worst in the world”.

KATHMANDU, Feb 15 (IPS) - A proposal by Nepal’s Immigration Department requiring consent from a guardian and local government for women under the age of 40 travelling to the Gulf or Africa has sparked public fury, and is taken as yet another proof of a misogynist, bungling bureaucracy. 

SYDNEY, Australia, Feb 15 (IPS) - Keenan Mundine grew up in the Aboriginal community social housing called The Blockinfamous for poor living conditions, alcohol and drug use, and violence, in Sydney’s Redfern suburb. At the age of about seven, soon after losing his parents to drugs and suicide, he was separated from his siblings and placed in kinship care.

BELGRADE, Serbia / LAGHMAN PROVINCE, Afghanistan / ESKİŞEHİR, Turkey, Feb 15 (IPS) - How much is a girl worth? If you are Maja, the answer is a chicken, a six-pack of beer and 100 euros.

That is how much her family, living in a Roma settlement in Serbia, received in exchange for her hand “in marriage.” She was 11 years old at the time. “They benefited maybe a month from it, and I was left with a problem for my whole life,” Maja, now 18, said.

UNITED NATIONS, Feb 12 (IPS) - It is crucial to ensure that any transition to a digital economy has mechanisms in place that are non-digital to avoid “double exclusion”, according to Shahrashoub Razavi, director of the social protection department at the International Labour Organisation (ILO).

DENVER, Colorado, Feb 12 (IPS) - Last fall, a 45-year-old father of four named Moses turned on the radio at his home in Arusha, Tanzania. Searching for his favorite station, he heard the introduction to a program about girls that he would later describe as ‘ear-catching.’ He wanted to know what would come next.

KINGSTON, Jamaica, Feb 12 (IPS) - It was a joyful, tearful celebration in the early morning hours of Dec. 30, 2020 for countless Argentinians when they heard the news: the senate had legalized terminations up to 14 weeks of pregnancy. Prior to this, activists have said that more than 3,000 women died of botched, illegal abortions since 1983. And across the Latin American and Caribbean (LAC) region, this renewed sense of optimism was compounded after President Joe Biden rescinded what is known as the “global gag rule,” which essentially denied funding to international non-profit organizations that provided abortion counseling or referrals.