WASHINGTON, Jan 14 (IPS) - Environmentalists and some lawmakers are decrying a surprise move by conservative members of Congress to roll back landmark “clean energy” policies guiding U.S. investments in overseas power projects.

RIO DE JANEIRO, Jan 14 (IPS) - Residents of the small community of Rio dos Macacos, made up of descendants of slaves in the northeastern Brazilian state of Bahia, reported to United Nations experts that they were attacked by military personnel from the Aratu naval base, which occupies part of their land.

HARARE, Jan 14 (IPS) - Evelyn Mhasi, a qualified nurse, has not worked in her profession for the last seven years. Hiring in several Zimbabwean government sectors, including nursing, remains frozen despite colleges churning out skilled professionals each year.

NAIROBI, Jan 14 (IPS) - Controversy and confusion have marked Kenya’s transition from analogue to digital television in keeping with the 2015 International Telecommunication Union deadline when all analogue signal transmission will cease. 

CAIRO, Jan 14 (IPS) - As Egyptians head for a referendum Tuesday and Wednesday this week, the fate of the Muslim Brotherhood, which was swept into government in the last election, hangs in balance.

PETROLANDIA, Brazil, Jan 13 (IPS) - Valdenor de Melo has been waiting for 27 years for the land and cash compensation he is due because his old farm was left underwater when the Itaparica hydroelectric dam was built on the São Francisco river in Brazil’s semiarid Northeast.

YAOUNDÉ, Cameroon, Jan 13 (IPS) - “I can’t wait to return back home,” Celeste Edjangue, a refugee from the Central African Republic (CAR) now in Cameroon’s East Region, told IPS.

JORDAN VALLEY, Israeli-occupied West Bank, Jan 13 (IPS) - Israeli settler Gadi Blumenfeld distributes machetes to 15 Palestinian labourers and instructs them to cut the thorns off of his dates’ fronds. “I might be stabbed in the back,” he says, “but thanks to farming, we keep the area safe from terrorists.”

MONTEVIDEO, Jan 12 (IPS) - Uruguay, about to become the first country in the world where the state will fully regulate production, sale and distribution of marijuana, will spend the next few months selecting a good quality strain of the crop that can be sold at a price similar to current illegal prices.

UNITED NATIONS, Jan 11 (IPS) - As the death toll rises from South Sudan's spiraling political and ethnic conflict, the ability of the U.N. to enforce its peacekeeping mandate in the country is coming under increased scrutiny.