News headlines in July 2024, page 20

ATLANTA, Georgia, Jul 10 (IPS) - Herman Wouk’s 1971 novel The Winds of War traced the romance, bravery, fear, and faith required for American youths to join the military, deploy to the war zones, and confront the mighty Axis threat in the lead-up to WW II. It later became a dramatic TV series.

UNITED NATIONS, Jul 10 (IPS) - An overwhelmingly staggering 186,000 killings in Gaza—compared with the official figure of over 37,000—has resurrected accusations of genocide and war crimes in the devastating nine-month-old war between Israel and Hamas, with no signs of a cease-fire.

The new estimates have come from The Lancet, one of the most prestigious peer-reviewed British medical journals.

Jul 09 (IPS) - Sarai e Shamali camp in Kabul is a temporary refugee shelter. The camp receives on average 100 Afghans a day, forcibly returned from Pakistan and Iran where most had sought asylum when the Taliban took over power in Afghanistan three years ago.

Jul 09 (IPS) - At least 84 Emirati human rights defenders and political dissidents are on trial in the UAE, facing death sentences or life in prison on spurious charges related to their political activism and human rights work, in a case that has its origins in another from over a decade ago. A verdict is expected July 10.

WASHINGTON DC, Jul 09 (IPS) - Across East Asia, birthrates are plummeting. Japan’s has been falling for eight straight years and recently hit a record low of 1.2 children per woman, the lowest since record keeping began in 1899.

Transnational crime syndicates based in Southeast Asia are fuelling the trafficking of people, either forcing them to commit crimes or for sexual exploitation in so-called “scam farms” that have spread across the region, according to the United Nations.

The UN human rights office (OHCHR) remains “extremely worried” for the well-being of 13 UN staff and a number of NGO employees arbitrarily detained in Yemen, spokesperson Jeremy Laurence said on Tuesday, demanding their unconditional release.

Eight athletes and one guide runner are set to compete in the Paris 2024 Paralympic Games as the largest-ever Refugee Paralympic Team, the International Paralympic Committee announced on Tuesday.

The UN human rights chief Volker Türk expressed his outrage on Tuesday at Russia’s latest airstrikes on Ukrainian cities which killed dozens and hit the country’s biggest children’s hospital in the capital Kyiv.

The UN’s top humanitarian official has reiterated strong condemnation of deadly missile attacks on multiple Ukrainian cities on Monday, while a senior doctor from the capital’s main children’s hospital described to the Security Council the “real hell” endured by patients and medical staff alike after it came under fire.