News headlines in 2013, page 166

HEBRON, Occupied West Bank, Apr 22 (IPS) - "Three interrogators questioned me for three hours. I was handcuffed. They beat me, slapped me, kicked me, boxed me, accused me of throwing stones; played a video of a demonstration. I denied I was there. So again, they beat me up," recounts Zein Abu-Mariya, 17, seated on a sofa next to dad.

MOGADISHU, Apr 22 (IPS) - In the Hamarweyne market, Mogadishu's largest, 24-year-old Maryama Yunis is finding success with her tiny cosmetic store. The young Somali entrepreneur has been in business for two years, selling everything from soaps and shampoos to lipsticks and eyeliners, and now she's turning a decent profit.

HARGEISA, Apr 22 (IPS) - A wind turbine, situated some 20 kilometres outside of Somaliland's capital Hargeisa, has become a significant totem of the country's changing energy landscape.

GENEVA, Apr 21 (IPS) - As parties to the treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) begin their second preparatory conference in Geneva on Monday, representatives of civil society and several countries have decided to bring the festering nuclear issue and its potential humanitarian consequences to the centre stage.

BELGRADE, Apr 21 (IPS) - On Apr. 19, Serbia and Kosovo put years of animosity aside when their prime ministers Ivica Dacic and Hashim Thaci initialled the first ever agreement between Belgrade and Pristina that should lead to normalisation of relations between the two former enemies.

GUWAHATI, India, Apr 21 (IPS) - The year 2013 opened on a disastrous note for the one-horned rhinoceros of the northeastern Indian state of Assam. At the beginning of April, officials in the Kaziranga National Park (KNP), one of the last retreats left in South Asia for these endangered creatures, reported that 17 rhinos had been poached.

UNITED NATIONS, Apr 20 (IPS) - When international human rights groups launch a global campaign next week to ban "fully autonomous weapons", they will follow in the footsteps of the highly-successful 1990s collective worldwide effort to ban anti-personnel landmines and blinding lasers.

WASHINGTON, Apr 20 (IPS) - Backed by the German government and prominent civil society voices, United Nations experts are calling for the World Bank to explicitly incorporate international human right standards into its "safeguards" to minimise negative impacts of bank financing on vulnerable communities and environments.

WASHINGTON, Apr 20 (IPS) - "Recall the face of the poorest and weakest man you have seen, and ask yourself if this step you contemplate is going to be any use to him."

WASHINGTON, Apr 19 (IPS) - Development experts here are warning that widespread, unchecked violence against citizens in Latin America is posing a threat to the development of the entire region.