The concept of commodity fetishism helps explain where today's climate policies have gone wrong. In classic fetishistic fashion, "cost-saving" institutional practices have helped entrench many dangerous equivalences across society: equivalences among molecules, places, technologies and times; equivalences between offsets and emissions reductions, between biotic and fossil carbon, between hypothetical and real reductions, between fines and fees, between uncertainty and probability and so on. This illustrated powerpoint presentation diagnoses 12 examples of climate fetishism currently shaping the thoughts and behaviour of research institutions, UN climate negotiators, national governments, large corporations, physical scientists, traders and others.

A coalition of 140 international organizations has sent a letter to Brazil's President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva to demand that he immediately halt plans to build Belo Monte Dam on the Amazon's Xingu River due to its immense social and environmental impacts, and instead consider alternatives.

Fourteen Egyptian human rights groups have expressed their full support of the statement issued by the UN High Commissioner of Human Rights which condemned the Egyptian security forces for killing up to 60 migrants on the Egyptian side of the borders with Israeli since mid 2007.

Mawuli Dake

Momar Dieng

Many are saying food is becoming the new oil. In the past two years there has been a remarkable increase in purchases of large-scale farmland by foreigners throughout Africa, Latin America, Central Asia, and Southeast Asia.

"Anyone concerned about the future of the planet," writes Professor Ted Benton of the University of Essex, "should read this book. The contributors give powerful evidence and argument to show that the carbon trading regimes favoured by the world's elites will not work -- and are, indeed, set to make things worse. But the message is not negative. There are alternatives, both effective and desirable."

Inadequate healthcare is just one of many challenges facing the 16,200 refugees in this sprawling camp in western Uganda, which is served by a single doctor. Among those waiting in one of the camp’s two health centres when IRIN visited was Mirian, 30, whose child was shivering with fever, most likely caused by malaria.

The International Awards is accepting applications for the position of Project Manager (new position) and Programme Research and Admin Officer (new position), based at the International Award. To apply for either of these positions, please email CV along with a detailed statement, which outlines your suitability for the position, to [email][email protected] The deadline for applications for the Project Manager role is Thursday 11th March 2010 – by 3pm. Interviews will be taking place at the Award House on Monday 15th March. The deadline for applications for the Programme Research and Admin Officer is Monday 29thMarch 2010 by 12 noon with interviews being held at the Award House w/c 5th April.

An Observer investigation reveals how rich countries faced by a global food shortage now farm an area double the size of the UK to guarantee supplies for their citizens

Anti-C-300' pamphlets, buttons and large signs are everywhere at this year's the Prospectors and Developers Association of Canada's (PDAC's) annual convention, as Canadian mining industry groups turn the heat up in efforts to block the controversial legislation. Bill C-300, if approved, would allow Canada's government to investigate complaints about Canadian resources firms operating in foreign countries and withhold taxpayer-funded financing, such as from Export Development Canada, from transgressors.

On March 10th MPs discussed the Chagos islands as the subject of a Westminster Hall debate, with the overwhelming message from parliamentarians being that the Government should resolve its legal dispute with the Chagossians and restore their right to return. The debate was initiated by Chairman of the Chagos Islands APPG Jeremy Corbyn, who urged the Government to reach a friendly settlement to the impending European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) case.

Each year between 50 000 to 100 000 women worldwide are affected by obstetric fistula, a hole in the birth canal. The development of obstetric fistula is directly linked to one of the major causes of maternal mortality: obstructed labour.

Voices of Dissent. Activists Engagements in the Creation of Alternative, Autonomous, Radical and Independent Media.
Interface is a new journal produced twice yearly by activists and academics around the world in response to the development and increased visibility of social movements in the last few years – and the immense amount of knowledge generated in this process. This knowledge is created across the globe, and in many contexts and a variety of ways, and it constitutes an incredibly valuable resource for the further development of social movements. Interface responds to this need, as a tool to help our movements learn from each other’s struggles, by developing analyses and knowledge that allow lessons to be learned from specific movement processes and experiences and translated into a form useful for other movements.

The Africa Initiative of Syracuse University, recognizes the need for the debate on Africa-China relations to transcend the emerging Sino-phobic scholarship and analyses that conceptualize Africa-China relations only through the limited lens of exploitation, new imperialism and anti-democracy. Towards this end, the Africa Initiative will host a select group of distinguished scholars to assess and deliberate on the nature and future of Sino-African relations and cooperation. This special symposium will be held from 8th-10th April 2010 in the main campus of Syracuse University in Syracuse, New York.

Featuring Norah Matovu-Winyi, Monica Amollo and Pollyne Owoko, of a United Nations 'global conversation' video-stream on women's rights, gender equality and maternal health. Drawing on their experiences as gender activists, the participants discuss the women's movement, meeting the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) and the future challenges for achieving sexual equality in Kenya.

Domestic workers around the world are organizing to challenge the harsh, abusive, often slave-like conditions in which they work. They are organizing unions and support networks, and they are mobilizing in support of an international Convention that will finally recognize them as workers and establish their rights in international law.

The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and the Universitat Oberta de Catalunya's (UOC) Department of Food Systems, Culture and Society are partnering to offer a fully accredited, online certificate in Food Security: Assessment and Action.

This International Women's Day, we not only mark the 3 year anniversary of the Women WON'T wait. End HIV and Violence Against Women. NOW. campaign, but also reflect on where we are since the historic 4th World Conference on Women in 1995. The Beijing Platform of Action contained milestone commitments to the world’s women, such as the possibility of a future where it was possible to end all forms of violence against women; women’s poverty and our unequal share of caring work within and outside the home; as well as socio-cultural discrimination, sexual disciplining, and political exclusions of various categories of people, including women.

EG Justice Needs Your Help.

now to STOP the UNESCO-Obiang International Prize for the Life Sciences.

In 2008, the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) created the UNESCO-Obiang International Prize for the Life Sciences, named for and financed by the autocratic and abusive president of the oil-rich West African country of Equatorial Guinea, Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo.

The prize is said to recognize 'scientific achievements that improve the quality of human life.' Meanwhile, the quality of life in Equatorial Guinea today remains abysmal. In spite of having attained the highest GDP per capita in Sub-Saharan Africa, 60 per cent of Equatoguineans live on less than US$1 a day in conditions comparable to Haiti or Chad. President Obiang has neglected to invest available resources in basic social services, resulting in declining primary school attendance, poor health indicators, and needless poverty.

The UNESCO Obiang Prize is a cynical ploy to co-opt the worthy name and reputation of UNESCO to enhance the image of a notorious dictatorship. The prize amounts to international approval for this kleptocratic and abusive regime and it undermines UNESCO’s mission to promote education, science, culture, and human rights.

You can help, by signing this petition to UNESCO!

Let’s send a message to UNESCO that corruption and abuse should not be rewarded and that funds used to create this prize should be reinvested in the people of Equatorial Guinea.

Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative (CHRI) is deeply concerned at the continued restrictions and threats to opposition parties in the run-up to Rwanda’s presidential elections on 9 August 2010 and urges the Rwandan government to take immediate steps to ensure respect for the basic, universal rights to freedom of expression, freedom of association and peaceful assembly of opposition parties. The absence of these rights is tantamount to breaches of the Commonwealth’s fundamental political principles that insist on free and fair elections (Harare Declaration 1991).