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By UN News
NEW YORK (IDN) — The world needs the continued moral leadership of the people of Hiroshima, the top United Nations disarmament official said, commemorating the 73rd anniversary of the atomic bombing that devastated the city while lamenting that after decades of momentum towards a nuclear-free world, “progress has stalled.”
By MATSUI Kazumi, Mayor of the City of Hiroshima
Every year on August 6, the City of Hiroshima holds a Peace Memorial Ceremony to pray for the peaceful repose of the victims, for the abolition of nuclear weapons, and for lasting world peace. During that ceremony, the Mayor issues a Peace Declaration directed toward the world at large. This is part of Hiroshima's effort to build a world of genuine and lasting world peace where no population will ever again experience the cruel devastation suffered by Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
By Lisa Vives
NEW YORK (IDN) — A coalition of news outlets says it has unearthed evidence that Rwandan authorities are among the governments using a powerful surveillance tool to spy on thousands of activists, journalists and politicians through their cellphones.
The spyware, developed by Israeli hackers for a company called the NSO Group, has dubbed the piece of computer programming with the name Pegasus. It reportedly extracts information from cellphones with a single text message that can’t be traced back to the government using it.
By Kester Kenn Klomegah*
MOSCOW (IDN) — The Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs has announced that it would allocate US$1 million to an international program that promotes free media in developing countries over the next five years.
The funds will go toward UNESCO’s International Program for the Development of Communication (IPDC) at US$250,000 per year in Africa, Latin America, and Asia, as well as in post-Soviet countries, from 2022-2025, according to the Foreign Ministry's official statement.
Viewpoint by Yossef Ben-Meir and Ellen Hernandez
Dr. Yossef Ben-Meir is President of the High Atlas Foundation in Morocco. Professor Ellen Hernandez teaches in English at Camden County College in the United States.
MARRAKECH (IDN) — When community meetings are held to determine priority development projects in villages, in neighborhoods, in schools, in agricultural fields—wherever they may take place—we want to speak the language that is spoken there, spoken every day. The idea of a person or a community of people exploring what they most want in their lives should be as real and as connected to their notion of “self” as possible.
Viewpoint By Sugeeswara Senadhira
With increasing Chinese influence in Sri Lanka, the Indian government is lately trying to use Sri Lanka's "non-implementation" of the 13th amendment to the constitution to provide more autonomy to Tamil areas of the island as agreed 34 years ago, in the infamous Indo-Sri Lanka Agreement, to interfere in Sri Lanka's internal affairs. But as Presidential international media advisor Sugeeswara Senadhira argues, since India could not deliver their side of the promises made in the agreement, it should be left for the historians to handle.
Viewpoint by Jonathan Power*
LUND, Sweden (IDN) — Let me appear to be cynical for once. I’m constantly arguing that war can be avoided and even pre-empted if would-be war criminals are arrested and stopped in their tracks. But what if the way to end a war is not to intervene, not to help, but to encourage the likely winner to get on with it and get the job done?
By Lisa Vives, Global Information Network
NEW YORK (IDN) — With warm words of welcome, Ivory Coast President Alassane Ouattara hugged his former arch enemy and rival Laurent Gbagbo, 10 years after the two were locked in ethnically-fuelled combat over a disputed election.
Former president Gbagbo has now returned to the land of his birth one year after his acquittal by the International Criminal Court (ICC) for alleged crimes against humanity.
By Lisa Vives, Global Information Network
NEW YORK (IDN) — The Netherlands-based International Court of Arbitration has affirmed that money transfers to a company controlled by the first daughter of Angola’s ex-president Jose Eduardo dos Santos were “contaminated by illegality” and should be considered “null and void.”
By Arun Srivastava*
NEW DELHI (IDN) — World history is full of narratives of peasant struggles and uprising. India also has seen many of them which had different perspectives and dimensions.
Early peasant movements were usually against feudal and semi-feudal societies and resulted in violent uprisings.
IDN-InDepthNews offers news analyses, features, reports and viewpoints that impact the world and its peoples. It has been online since 2009. Its network spans countries around the world.