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Photo: View of Santo Domingo streets. Credit: Adobe Stock

Latin America and the Caribbean Boost Chances of Success at Climate Conference

By Caroline Mwanga

NEW YORK | SANTO DOMINGO (IDN) — The three-day Virtual Thematic Sessions of the Latin America and the Caribbean Climate Week 2021 (LACCW2021), which wrapped up on May 14, hosted by the Government of the Dominican Republic, are reported to have provided important momentum for a successful UN Climate Change Conference COP26 from November 1 to November 12 in Glasgow.

The primary aim of regional climate weeks, organized every year in Latin America and the Caribbean, Africa, Asia-Pacific, and Middle East, and North Africa, is to bring together diverse stakeholders from the public and private sectors to address climate issues under one umbrella and unity of purpose.

: Caroline Mwanga; SUSTAINABILITY; Health & Well Being; 16 May 2021

Stop Muddying The Waters On The Appointment Of The CTBTO Executive Secretary

Viewpoint by Tariq Rauf*

“And so … ask not what your country can do for you — ask what you can do for your country”, President John Kennedy, 20 January 1961.

VIENNA (IDN) — For the better part of a year, diplomats from more than 180 countries have been feuding over the appointment of the Executive Secretary of the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organization (CTBTO) located in Vienna, alongside the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).

The Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT) bans nuclear explosions “by everyone, everywhere: on the Earth's surface, in the atmosphere, underwater and underground”.

: Opinion Editor; OPINION; 16 May 2021

Photo: UN Women Executive Director Ms Mlambo-Ngcuka, and UN High Representative for Disarmament Affairs Ms Nakamitsu. Sources: UN Women and UNDOA

Put People Before Runaway Military Spending

Viewpoint by Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka and Izumi Nakamitsu

Ms Mlambo-Ngcuka Executive Director of UN Women and Ms Nakamitsu is UN High Representative for Disarmament Affairs. This OpEd was first published on May 6.

NEW YORK (IDN) — For all of us, but especially women, the pandemic is a reminder that traditional notions of “security” that fuel the weapons industry cannot protect us from dangers and challenges we routinely face.

: Opinion Editor; OPINION; 15 May 2021

Image: The UNESCO World Conference on Education for Sustainable Development will be held as a virtual conference from 17 to 19 May 2021. Credit: UNESCO

Education For Sustainable Development as Overarching Framework to Achieve the SDGs

Viewpoint by Simone Galimberti

The writer is Co-Founder of ENGAGE, a not-for-profit in Nepal. He writes on volunteerism, social inclusion, youth development, and regional integration as an engine to improve people’s lives. He can be reached at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

KATHMANDU, Nepal (IDN) — A life insurance policy for humanity, this is how Audrey Azoulay, the UNESCO Director-General defined the scope of all efforts focused on addressing climate change and the persistent degradation of our biodiversity.

: Opinion Editor; OPINION; 15 May 2021

Image source: Africa Vaccine Manufacturing Initiative (AVMI).

COVID-19: Africa Needs to Break the Circle of Dependency

Interview by Kester Kenn Klomegah*

MOSCOW (IDN) — Africa Vaccine Manufacturing Initiative (AVMI) primarily aims at promoting the establishment of sustainable human vaccine manufacturing capacity in Africa. Since its establishment, AVMI together with multiple and different partners, have been advocating for the establishment of vaccine development and manufacturing in Africa.

With the outbreak of coronavirus, AVMI has embarked on public education on the risk of the pandemic and further been persuading African leaders about the need to seriously prioritize the manufacturing of vaccines instead of depending on external supply.

: Kester Kenn Klomegah; OPINION; 14 May 2021

Photo: Sri Lanka Foreign Minister Dinesh Gunawardena summoned Canadian High Commissioner David McKinnon and expressed Sri Lanka’s deep concern over the adoption of Private Member Bill 104. Credit: @MFA_SriLanka, Official Twitter Account of the Foreign Ministry of Sri Lanka.

Canada’s LTTE-Inspired Myopic View On ‘Genocide’

By Sugeeswara Senadhira

The writer is Media Advisor at the Presidential secretariat.

COLOMBO (IDN) — Genocide is the intentional destruction of a particular group through killing, serious physical or mental harm, preventing births and/or forcibly transferring children to another group and this term has been applied to the experiences of Indigenous peoples in Canada, particularly in the final reports of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission and the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls inquiry.—The Canadian Encyclopedia.

: Kalinga Seneviratne; OPINION; 14 May 2021

Photo: Dusk approaches in Yangon, the commercial hub of Myanmar (file photo). Unsplash/Alexander Schimmeck.

UN Experts Call on Myanmar Businesses ‘To Take a Stand’ Against Military Junta

By Caroline Mwanga

NEW YORK (IDN | UN News) — Independent rights experts of the United Nations have urged businesses in Myanmar to fulfill their human rights responsibilities and pressure the military junta to halt grave human rights violations against its own people.

According to UN News, some businesses have reiterated their public support for the rule of law and human rights and cut ties with the junta in the aftermath of the 1 February coup.

: Caroline Mwanga; THE WORLD; Asia-Pacific; 13 May 2021

Widespread Frustration in Nigeria Would Not Justify a Coup

The writer is the Managing Director/Editor-in-Chief of LEADERSHIP newspaper based in Abuja, Nigeria.

ABUJA (IDN) — These days, it seems all right to play with fire. The blaze started as a solitary spark in Mali in August when the streets, the elite, and jihadists banded to remove President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita.

The former president had discarded election results and written a version that tightened his grip on power. How he thought he could reinvent the Mansa Musa legend in a country riven by violence and poverty only he can tell.

: Opinion Editor; OPINION; 13 May 2021

Photo: US Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates and other members of NATO Ministers of Defense and of Foreign Affairs meet at NATO headquarters in Brussels, Belgium, Oct. 14, 2010.

NATO Plans to Focus on Russia and China

By Robert Johnson

BRUSSELS (IDN) — “What we are currently experiencing is the brain death of NATO,” French President Emmanuel Macron declared in a blunt interview with The Economist in November 2019. Europe stands on “the edge of a precipice”, he said, and needs to start thinking of itself strategically as a geopolitical power; otherwise, we will “no longer be in control of our destiny.”

: Robert Johnson; ARMAMENTS; Nuclear Weapons; 12 May 2021

Photo: The writer at the Vatican in 2019.

The Nuclear Threat in the New Information Age

Viewpoint by Daryl G. Kimball

The writer is the executive director of Arms Control Association and publisher of Arms Control Today since 2001. The following is the text of Mr Kimball's Foreword to 2021 Joint Media Project Report of the Non-Profit International Press Syndicate Group with IDN as flagship agency in partnership with Soka Gakkai International in consultative status with ECOSOC.

WASHINGTON, DC (IDN) — An informed and mobilized public is essential to human survival in the nuclear age—and effective and independent journalism is essential to revealing the hard truths, the consequences, and the choices that nuclear weapons pose for all of us.