National and international civil society groups Thursday hailed the U.S. Senate's passage of a major financial reform act that includes a key anti-corruption provision requiring energy and mining companies to publicly disclose payments they make to governments around the world.

Argentina is officially the first Latin American country to allow same-sex couples to marry, with the passage of a law Thursday that also permits gay couples to adopt children and to use assisted fertilisation to conceive a baby, rights that were hitherto restricted to heterosexual couples.

U.S. officials are explaining Iranian scientist Shahram Amiri's return to Iran as the result of a defector having a change of heart because of his concern about Iranian government threats to his family. Iran and Amiri himself have insisted that it is a simple case of a victim of abduction escaping his captors.

A long outstanding proposal to recognise the right to water as a basic universal human right is threatening to split the world's rich and poor nations.

The fragile health system in the cash-strapped Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK), long described as one of the world's most secretive countries, is on the verge of collapsing, Amnesty International (AI) warned Thursday.

Standing between two wooden planks that shore up the front of her small makeshift house, 40-year-old Maribel Huerta talks about her family.

The environment remains a second-tier matter in Latin America and the Caribbean despite being interwoven with persistent poverty and stalled economic development in the region, according to a new report from the United Nations Environment Programme.

In a western corner of Cambodia known for battles waged by the genocidal Khmer Rouge decades ago, a new war is being fought. Its target, this time, is the lethal malaria parasite that is resistant to the most effective drugs available today.

The Everything but Arms trade initiative, which provides preferential treatment to poor countries, benefits only a limited range of people in the target populations. It should also be expanded to more countries, civil society organisations say.

Heavy reliance on petroleum imports, the need for electricity in rural areas, and the ongoing effort towards sustainable development have focussed Central America's attention on renewable energy. But that doesn't mean there isn't opposition.