UNITED NATIONS, Nov 23 (IPS) - When the U.N. Security Council (UNSC) adopted a landmark resolution numbered 1325 back in 2000, it was supposed to integrate gender into its core mandate: the establishment and maintenance of international peace and security.

SANTIAGO DE CUBA, Nov 23 (IPS) - "The city looked as if it had been bombed. On the way to my office, I passed people who had the same shocked look on their faces as I did. We would look at each other, and even though we were strangers, we'd ask ‘How did things go for you? Did anything happen to your house?' It was a kind of warm solidarity that did me a lot of good."

BUENOS AIRES, Nov 23 (IPS) - Argentine scientists agree that there are signs of recovery of the ozone layer that protects life on earth by filtering out the sun's harmful ultraviolet radiation, but they are cautious about saying that the problem is on its way to a solution.

KATHMANDU, Nov 23 (IPS) - Nepal now ranks 11^th on a list of the world's most earthquake-prone countries, yet it remains one of the least disaster-prepared nations globally.

CAIRO, Nov 23 (IPS) - The reaction of post-revolution Egypt to Israel's weeklong onslaught on the next-door Gaza Strip – brought to a halt temporarily at least by a Wednesday night ceasefire – has contrasted sharply with the former regime's callous approach to the besieged coastal enclave.

GAZA CITY, Nov 23 (IPS) - The ceasefire has brought extremities in Gaza. In the morning the coastal territory woke up bashed and bloody from one of Israel's most intensive nights of bombardment since a week's tit for tat violence broke out between Hamas and Israel. By late morning the coastal strip was ghostly quiet, gripped with fear as people stayed indoors awaiting the inevitable retaliation from Israel for a bus bombing carried out in Tel Aviv by Palestinian extremists. But as night fell thousands of Gazans took to the streets in joyful celebration in what they see as victory over Israel.

JOHANNESBURG, Nov 23 (IPS) - South African smallholder farmer Motlasi Musi is not happy with the African Centre for Biosafety's call for his country and Africa to ban the cultivation, import and export of all genetically modified maize. "I eat genetically modified maize, which I have been growing on my farm for more than seven years, and I am still alive," he declared.

SANTIAGO, Nov 22 (IPS) - In Chile, not only do all people diagnosed with HIV/AIDS receive treatment, but the country also has advanced mechanisms for monitoring outcomes of the antiretroviral therapy.

GENEVA, Nov 22 (IPS) - There are numerous reasons to believe that the forces that have been driving growth in developing and emerging economies since 2009 cannot be sustained over the medium term. At the same time, it is impossible to return to the extremely favourable international economic conditions that prevailed before the eruption of the global crisis.

NEW DELHI, Nov 22 (IPS) - One day after voting against a United Nations General Assembly draft resolution seeking to abolish the death penalty, India executed Pakistani national Mohammad Ajmal Kasab for the November 2008 terror rampage in Mumbai that left 166 people dead.