News headlines in March 2025

BLANTYRE, Mar 31 (IPS) - In Malawi, being a forest guard isn’t a glamorous, sought-after job. And it has often been quiet, enjoying almost no publicity – until recently amid the worsening crashing down of the country’s forests, which is making the occupation increasingly perilous.

Mar 31 (IPS) - 2025 marks the tenth anniversary of the Paris Climate Agreement. One of its chief architects, Christiana Figueres, says the world is heading in the right direction but warns that urgent action is needed to close critical gaps.

Mar 31 (IPS) - CIVICUS discusses recent protests in Serbia with Alma Mustajbaši?, researcher at Civic Initiatives, a Serbian civil society organisation that advocates for democracy, human rights and citizen engagement.

WASHINGTON DC, Mar 31 (IPS) - Southeast Asia’s major economies have made major strides over the last couple of decades. The largest have seen income per capita grow at least three-fold over the past 20 years amid global integration and prudent policymaking.

Entire communities in central Myanmar have been devastated and the full scale of the earthquake disaster “remains unclear”, the UN’s top humanitarian coordinator in the country said on Monday.

The UN Emergency Relief Coordinator Tom Fletcher on Monday called for “justice and answers” after Israeli forces killed eight Palestinian medics, six civil defence first responders and a UN staff member in an attack in southern Gaza.

The human toll of the earthquake which devastated central Myanmar continues to rise, UN humanitarians warned on Sunday, putting more pressure on nearly 20 million people who were already in need of aid.

Countries should consider looking beyond Gross Domestic Product, or GDP, as the key measure of economic growth to achieve the ambitious Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), UN policymakers have suggested.

The UN Secretary-General on Saturday strongly condemned an attack on peacekeepers serving with UN mission MINUSCA in the Central African Republic which left one Kenyan ‘blue helmet’ dead.

Latest news reports indicate that over 1,600 have been killed in Myanmar with thousands injured following two powerful earthquakes on Friday which have left hundreds trapped under rubble.