WASHINGTON, Sep 19 (IPS) - Regulators here are proposing that most U.S. corporations be required to provide annual public reporting on how the pay received by their chief executive compares to that of their average workers, a requirement proponents say could be a first step in reining in an unprecedented swelling in executive compensation.

UNITED NATIONS, Sep 18 (IPS) - Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir, accused of war crimes and genocide in the politically-troubled Darfur region, is apparently planning to visit New York and address the U.N. General Assembly next week.

HARRISBURG, Pennsylvania, U.S., Sep 18 (IPS) - Every nation in the world has been invited to participate at the highest political level in the High-Level Meeting of the General Assembly on Nuclear Disarmament scheduled for Sep. 26. This has never happened before. We have never been at such a moment of crisis and opportunity.

UNITED NATIONS, Sep 18 (IPS) - The concerns of developing countries about credit rating agencies (CRAs) risk going unheard as regulatory bodies around the world tackle questions raised after the 2008 financial crisis.

LONDON, Sep 18 (IPS) - Over 20 years, disaster losses in developing nations have amounted to 862 billion dollars (a considerable under-estimate). During this period the international community has spent just 13.5 billion dollars on disaster risk reduction (DRR), equivalent to 40 cents of every 100 dollars of development aid – this has to change.

PORT OF SPAIN, Sep 18 (IPS) - Dianne Christian Simmons recalls the days when she would head out with her husband on fishing expeditions in the Gulf of Paria, a 3,000-square-mile shallow inland sea between Trinidad and Tobago and the east coast of Venezuela.

BAKASSI PENINSULA, Cameroon, Sep 18 (IPS) - Thomas Effiom, a 35-year old fisher in Jabane, a small locality in Cameroon's Bakassi Peninsula, scoops off floodwaters from the muddy floor of his house. It is a ritual he performs each time the Atlantic Ocean overflows.

BANGALORE, India, Sep 18 (IPS) - In spite of India's much-publicised national renewable energy policy as part of its international commitments to reduce carbon emissions, its Mid Day Meal (MDM) Scheme, the world's largest school lunch programme, has no energy conservation or even a fuel policy in its workings.

ST. PETERSBURG, Sep 18 (IPS) - "It's okay to be gay in Russia if you live in a big city such as St. Petersburg or Moscow, study at university or work at a liberal company, but even here you can't feel absolutely safe," says Nikita Mironov, describing the climate of fear that many homosexuals face in Russia.

WASHINGTON, Sep 18 (IPS) - On the eve of the 68^th session of the United Nations General Assembly, a newly released survey of 39 countries shows that the world body remains relatively popular around the globe.