News headlines in 2011, page 60

Despite the threat cadmium poses to health and the environment, Mexico has no plan to reduce the use of the heavy metal in the production of toys and industrial products like batteries and fertiliser.

This sinking mega-city’s eight million people are paying the price of ignoring warnings over many years concerning its climate vulnerability and the incapacity of its soggy foundations to handle flooding.

The Syrian government has accepted several measures suggested by the Arab League aimed at halting the violence in the country, including the removal of tanks and armoured vehicles from the streets.

Just six years after the completion of a dike that raised the level of the northern part of the Aral Sea by two metres and slashed its salt content by two-thirds, this remote Central Asian lake once synonymous with ecological catastrophe has become a model of environmental recovery.

A Tibetan monk set himself on fire last week while shouting slogans calling for the Dalai Lama’s return to Tibet during a religious ritual watched by hundreds, the advocacy group International Campaign for Tibet (ICT) reported last week.

Syrian refugees fleeing the brutal crackdown on citizens calling for an end to President Bashar al-Assad’s regime have encountered a sinister reception in neighbouring Lebanon.

Pakistani pilgrims travelling to Mecca for the current Haj season have one prayer on their lips — to be delivered from the terror that the Taliban have unleashed on their country.

While gender equality ratios have improved in 85 percent of countries over the past six years, economic participation and political empowerment for women has failed to match the steady progress of health and education, says a new report by the World Economic Forum.

The U.S. State Department Wednesday released a statement criticising what it said was a 'deteriorating' human rights situation in Uganda and the government's increasingly heavy- handed tactics to repress political opposition and silence dissent.

Amid growing tensions in the Middle East, including speculation about a possible Israeli attack on Iran, a key U.S. Congressional committee Wednesday approved two bills that would impose sweeping new economic and diplomatic sanctions against the Tehran.