Agnes-Josephine Kenderman, a Liberian teenage mother, is benefiting from a UN-backed initiative to empower young vulnerable girls, which includes training to help her make and sell pastries and other products.

ANAND, India, Jun 03 (IPS) - Common lands are natural resources that are used collectively by a community, such as forests, pastures, ponds, and ‘wastelands’. They act as a resource base for non-cash, non-market economies that provides fodder, fuelwood, water, oils, fish, medicinal herbs, and a wide variety of fruits and vegetables to the local communities.

Women and girls face “deadly consequences” in the Somali region of Ethiopia due to the worst drought conditions for forty years, according to the United Nations Population Fund, UNFPA.

STOCKHOLM, Jun 03 (IPS) - Warfare and misinformation are intimately connected. The 29th of May was globally observed as The Day of Communication and due to the ongoing war in Ukraine it was difficult to avoid thinking of affiliated propaganda campaigns, carried out by warring factions and far from indifferent bystanders.

Two Egyptian peacekeepers serving with the UN Mission in Mali, MINUSMA, were killed on Friday - the second fatal attack this week on a peacekeeping convoy in the West African country. 

The Stockholm+50 environment conference came to a close on Friday with a call for real commitments to urgently address global environmental concerns, and for a just transition to sustainable economies, that work for all.

Jun 03 (IPS) - Defending democracy has suddenly become one of the central challenges of our age. The land war in Ukraine is widely considered a front line between autocratic rule and democratic freedom. The United States continues to absorb the meaning of the riot that took place on January 6 2021 in an attempt to overthrow the result of the previous year’s election. Elsewhere, concerns have been raised that the pandemic could have provided cover for governments to postpone elections.

ROME, Jun 03 (IPS) - Developing countries are facing a combination of crises that are unprecedented in recent times. Over the last three years they have had to face the COVID-19 crisis, the food crisis, the energy crisis, the climate change crisis, the debt crisis and, on top of all this, a global recession. The crises have overlapped, and each has added to the problems created by the previous ones.

“This planet is our only home”, Secretary-General António Guterres said in his message for World Environment Day, to be marked this Sunday, warning that the Earth’s natural systems “cannot keep up with our demands”.  

Israel must halt plans to demolish a Bedouin village in the Naqab desert that will forcibly displace hundreds of residents in a bid to expand Jewish-only settlements, two experts appointed by the UN Human Rights Council said on Friday.