'There are no ceilings in our dreams; we want to transform young women, tell them there is a way for them to be happy,' says Elza Santiago, a resident of a 'favela' or shantytown in Brazil who defines her mission as 'mixing feminism with work.'

The countries of Latin America, with few exceptions, have weathered the global recession of the past two years relatively well, while they simultaneously continued the process of shedding neoliberal policies in their most fundamentalist form. But in financial terms, non-governmental organisations have not fared so well.

Andrew Rasiej hurriedly gets off the phone, explaining that he was talking to Arianna Huffington, founder of uber-website The Huffington Post. She just published a new book, and Rasiej was providing ideas on how to use social media to promote it.

'I'm going to do everything possible to raise my daughter. My daughter is my future. And I can see my future in her,' says Mirlene Saint Juste, a rice merchant in the Opoto market of Gonaives in northern Haiti.

The carbon dioxide emissions from burning such fossil fuels have now melted the Arctic sea ice to its lowest volume since before the rise of human civilisation and dangerously upsetting the energy balance of the entire planet, climate scientists are reporting.

'The homeland is not the flag / the anthem is not the country / that is just the varnish / that adorns the outside,' states a poem written in Spanish by artist Enrique Cisneros in reference to Mexico's ongoing bicentennial celebrations.

After a lapse of four months, Pukkie Mathika was finally able to break her silence, finding her way back to a busy intersection in the heart of an up-market shopping district here in Bangkok to rage against the Thai government.

Afghan voters just went to national parliamentary elections, but refugees from that country here in neighbouring Pakistan could only rue the fact that they have been left out of this vote.

With African countries' trade remaining inordinately dependent on natural resources exports, their economies could benefit from liberalisation of trade in services but only as long as proper domestic regulatory frameworks are put in place, some trade experts argue.

As China basks in international praise for its spectacular economic transformation over the last 30 years, some shadow sides of this story of triumph have begun to emerge.