ROME, Feb 05 (IPS) - Wheat rust, a family of fungal diseases that can cause crop losses of up to 100 per cent in untreated susceptible wheat, is making further advances in Europe, Africa and Asia, according to two new studies produced by scientists in collaboration with the United Nations.

ROME, Feb 03 (IPS) - European leaders should take decisive action to address the tragic loss of life on the Central Mediterranean route and the deplorable conditions for migrants and refugees in Libya, urged two major United Nations agencies dealing with migrants and refugees.

LAHORE, Feb 03 (IPS) - Amid a wave of reforms to tighten the country's laws on honour killings and sexual assault, on Feb. 2, the Sindh Assembly passed a law making DNA testing in rape cases mandatory in the province.

KUALA LUMPUR, Feb 03 (IPS) - New US President Donald Trump has long insisted that its major trading partners having been taking advantage of it. Changing these trade terms and conditions will thus be top priority for his administration, and central to overall Trump economic strategy to ‘Make America Great Again'.

ROME, Feb 02 (IPS) - Tired, lazy, bored, laying down long hours watching TV or seated checking your email? Wrong. And dangerous: not enough exercise contributes to cancer, diabetes, depression and other non-communicable diseases.

NAVOLATO, Mexico, Feb 01 (IPS) - He is eight years old and is looking for his younger sister, Zoe Zuleica Torres Gómez, who went missing in December 2015, when she was only five years old, in the northeastern state of San Luis Potosí. He is the youngest searcher for clandestine graves in Mexico.

JOHANNESBURG, Feb 01 (IPS) - Oxfam's latest estimate that just eight super-rich people – down from 62 last year and 388 just six years ago - own more wealth than the poorest half of the world population is a clarion call to change the way we think about and try to tackle inequality.

NEW YORK / UNITED NATIONS, Feb 01 (IPS) - Outgoing African Union Chair Nkosazana Dlamini Zuma has described the United States ban on refugees and immigrants from seven countries as "one of the greatest challenges and tests to our unity and solidarity."

GANGTOK, India, Feb 01 (IPS) - Bina Sharma, a member of the Melli Dhara Gram Panchayat Unit in the southern part of India's northeastern Himalayan state of Sikkim, is a relieved woman.

ALICANTE, Spain, Feb 01 (IPS) - Attacking the Affordable Care Act; the "global gag rule" against abortion; the federal regulation and hiring freeze; canceling the TPP; restarting the Keystone XL and Dakota Access Pipeline; limiting entry with the Mexican Wall; the 90-day travel ban on seven countries; more undocumented people prioritized for deportation; no federal funding for cities refusing to cooperate; communications blackout from federal agencies; Guantánamo torture continued–What does it add up to?