News headlines in August 2015, page 6

ATHENS, Aug 18 (IPS) - Just over a month ago, Greek citizens were asked to go to the polls for a referendum that posed the country with an unprecedented existential dilemma and challenged the EU with the possibility of its collapse.

RIO DE JANEIRO, Aug 18 (IPS) - The extraction of deepwater oil, the most abundant kind in Brazil, is costly but foments technological and industrial development, requiring increasingly complex production equipment and techniques.

JUBA, Aug 18 (IPS) - Dismissing efforts, including those of U.S. President Barack Obama, to sign off on a peace agreement and end the 20-month-long civil war in the world's newest nation, South Sudanese President Salva Kiir declined to sign, saying he needed more time for consultations.

NEW YORK, Aug 17 (IPS) - Egyptian authorities are already holding a record number of journalists behind bars, and a draconian new anti-terror law signed by President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi on Sunday will further broaden the crackdown on dissent, press freedom groups warn.

SANTIAGO, Aug 17 (IPS) - Latin America should assume a position of global leadership by adopting effective measures to protect the oceans, which are threatened by illegal fishing, the impacts of climate change, and pollution caused by acidification and plastic waste.

UNITED NATIONS, Aug 17 (IPS) - As hackers continue to rampage through closely-guarded information systems and databases with monotonous regularity, there is a tempting new target for cyber-attacks: the world's nuclear facilities.

PAHALGAM, India, Aug 17 (IPS) - As he struggled to find a section of the stream clean enough to rinse off his muddy shoes, Mohan Kumar, a Hindu pilgrim on his way to the holy Amarnath shrine in Indian-administered Kashmir, gazed with despair over the filth that lay thick on the landscape.

UNITED NATIONS, Aug 17 (IPS) - The efforts of the United Nations and the global women's movement to promote the women's rights agenda and make it a top international priority saw its culmination in the creation of U.N. Women, by the General Assembly in 2010.

BETHLEHEM, Palestine, Aug 15 (IPS) - The rubble of twisted concrete and metal bakes in the hot Mediterranean sun of a regional heat wave.

UNITED NATIONS, Aug 14 (IPS) - U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon stopped short of telling one his high-ranking Special Representatives: "You're fired."