News stories by Elizabeth Whitman, page 4

On Aug. 29, 1949, the Soviet Union conducted the first of 456 nuclear tests in Semipalatinsk in Eastern Kazakhstan, at the site where it ultimately held over two-thirds of all Soviet nuclear tests without warning inhabitants of the region of the impact of exposure to these tests.

A highly anticipated and controversial report on Israel's May 2010 interception of an aid flotilla bound for the Gaza Strip and subsequent killing of nine civilians and wounding of many others was finally leaked on Thursday, as diplomatic relations between Israel and Turkey continued to deteriorate.

For the majority of the world’s population, citizenship is a fact of life, something so fundamental that the idea of not being citizen to any state seems unfathomable. Yet for 12 million people worldwide, ordinary life as most people expect it is impossible because they belong to no country and are thus deprived of basic rights.

Four months before 2012 - the year a conference is slated to be held on freeing the Middle East region of weapons of mass destruction (WMDs) - no date, facilitator, or host country has been named.

The first High Level Meeting on Non-Communicable Diseases is scheduled to take place one month from now, but U.N. member states are lagging in preparing for it, an alliance of civil society organisations says.

Legislation incorporating gender identity protection has ignited debate among activists for gay and lesbian rights, with some arguing that the legislation actually endangers women and threatens their physical safety, while others contend that gender identity protection is key to obtaining equality for the LGBT community.

In Shishmaref, an Inupiaq village on an Alaskan barrier island north of the Bering Strait, a way of life is gradually disappearing due to higher temperatures, rising sea levels, declining numbers of sea animals to hunt, and shrinking shorelines wrought by climate change.

Israeli policies are destroying the livelihoods of Bedouin communities in the occupied West Bank and the Negev in southern Israel, activists and aid workers warn.

Government leaders, U.N. officials and representatives from over 400 hundred youth organisations concluded two days of talks Tuesday on such issues as the importance of youth in eradicating poverty and how to stabilise the global economic system in the face of myriad challenges.

Survey your surroundings and you'll discover that coal ash - waste from coal burned to produce electricity - is more present in everyday life than you might expect. To name a few places: toothpaste, cosmetics, wallboard, cement, and agricultural and winter de-icing products.