News stories by Kanya D'Almeida, page 8

Nearly three-quarters of activists and grassroots organisers working globally to safeguard women's rights are convinced that ending violence against women must be the top priority of the newly formed U.N. Women, according to a report launched Wednesday by Oxfam and VSO UK at the annual meeting of the Commission on the Status of Women in New York City.

Taking their place among a newly vocal chorus of protesters around the world, over 68,000 workers in the northeastern U.S. state of Wisconsin came out Tuesday to oppose a bill, sponsored by Republican Governor Scott Walker, designed to strip the labour force of its collective bargaining rights.

The U.N. Security Council is poised to vote this week on a new resolution condemning Israeli expansion into the Occupied Palestinian Territories and calling for an immediate freeze on settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, but the United States has already declared its intention to again deploy its veto power.

When U.S. President Barack Obama raised the curtain on a six- year, six-billion-dollar Global Health Initiative (GHI) in May 2009, he appeared to be embarking on the path of promises that paved the way to his election victory earlier that year.

In his commencement address to cadets at West Point Military Academy last year, U.S. President Barack Obama proclaimed, 'In the 21st century our women in uniform play an indispensable role in our national defence. Time and again they have proven themselves to be role models, not only for our daughters but also for our sons.'

While a mass uprising was toppling a dictatorship in Egypt and tens of thousands were marching for radical change at the World Social Forum in Dakar, a high-level group of ambassadors and experts came together at the United Nations late last week to discuss the future of global governance.

Former U.S. President George W. Bush may have mostly vanished from the headlines since January 2009, but the alleged crimes committed by his administration are not forgotten.

In the quiet desert community of Nomirage, located just 20 kilometres east of San Diego, the sounds of impending war creep over the silent landscape.

Despite birthing 100 percent of the world's children, growing 70 percent of the world's food and performing 60 percent of the world's labour, women only receive a fraction - a mere 10 percent - of the world's income.

In her remarks last week to the president of the U.N. Security Council on the first anniversary of Haiti's earthquake, U.S. Ambassador Susan Rice called for a free and fair election that reflected the views of Haitian voters, applauded the work of the U.N. Stabilisation Mission in Haiti (MINUSTAH), and declared that the 'prospects for rebuilding Haiti depend upon maintaining a secure environment and creating jobs for Haitians'.