News headlines in 2009, page 78

As the legal and moral implications of the UN Goldstone report on Israel's military assault on Gaza continue to mount, Gazans are taking matters into their own hands and preparing civil lawsuits.

Despite acrimonious exchanges between Sri Lanka and the European Union (EU) over human rights violations on which rests the fate of continued tax-free exports to Europe, development assistance continues unhindered to the Indian Ocean island, according to Europe’s top diplomat here.

The U.S. and NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organisation) have spent billions of dollars, sacrificed hundreds of lives and worked for years to fight insurgents and foster democracy in Afghanistan.

To the west of Peshawar on the Jamrud Road that leads to the historic Khyber Pass sits the Karkhano Market, a series of shopping plazas whose usual offering of contraband is now supplemented by standard issue U.S. military equipment, including combat fatigues, night vision goggles, body armour and army knives.

On the day his trade union section held elections for officials, 'our offices were occupied, damaged and ransacked' by thugs from the executive committee of the National Teachers Union (SNTE), said Mexican teacher Gerardo Cruz, a leader in the CNTE, a dissident caucus seeking reform within the union.

At the urging of a high-level U.S. government mission, the negotiating teams of ousted Honduran President Manuel Zelaya and de facto leader Roberto Micheletti restarted talks Thursday to find a solution to the four-month political crisis.

When in power, the Sierra Leone People's Party (SLPP) promised that thanks to its pursuit of a pro-agriculture agenda, no Sierra Leonean would go to bed hungry by 2007. But the appointed date came and the people were still hungry. Unfortunately for the SLPP, it was an election year.

As the effort to achieve universal health coverage within the U.S. crawls forward in Washington, a new report by a coalition of global health organisations details how the U.S. can 'help lead the world to universal access to comprehensive health care in developing countries'.

Low-income Eastern Europeans contracting easy consumer loans in the mid- 2000s are now falling below poverty lines.

Egypt has long been recognised as the cultural trendsetter of the Arabic- speaking world. Despite recent challenges to this role with the advent of satellite television, experts say that contemporary Arab culture remains largely defined by Egyptian literature, music, film and television.