Women fighting to be equal around the globe.

[the_future_modernes]

Imagining Urban Life without Catcalls or Rape
Kanya D'Almeida interviews INES ALBERDI, Executive Director of UNIFEM

UNITED NATIONS, Nov 22, 2010 (IPS) - The U.N. Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM) launched an ambitious new initiative to improve the safety and wellbeing of women in five major cities Monday - New Delhi, India; Cairo, Egypt; Quito, Ecuador; Kigali, Rwanda; and Port Moresby in Papua New Guinea.

In an interview with IPS, Ines Alberdi, executive director of UNIFEM, discussed the aspirations and trajectory of the 'Safe Cities' initiative, from its humble beginnings as a set of pilot programmes in various cities across Latin America, from Bogotá, Colombia, to Rosario, Argentina and Santiago, Chile.

These programmes were implemented after proposals from grassroots organisations for a comprehensive campaign on safety in cities, a landscape that has become a virtual war zone for millions of women.

Inspired by the programme's successes in Argentina, Guatemala, El Salvador, Peru, Brazil, Chile and Colombia, UNIFEM and UN Habitat began to mull the idea of going global. With solid regional bases already in place, UNIFEM has decided to work closely with local governments and municipalities to alter the urban landscape, making it safer for women and girls to navigate. MORE

( Read more... )

mod post!

[the_future_modernes]

*waves* Hey you all! This is your friendly neigborhood mod the_future_modernes checking in! The comm has been quiet lately I know! Was kinda soured on US politics for a while, which led to me ignoring all politics for the sake of my sanity. But I'm back now! And I'd like to work with you all to make the comm a nicely bustling place!There are after all 102 members and 117 subscribers! With that in mind, what can we do to make it easier for more of you all to post? I have gone ahead and added links to the side to the BBC, World News.com which is a newspaper aggregator, Caribbean News.com which is also a newspaper aggregator, and Himal, which is a South Asian magazine. Do you have any suggestions for more good news sources? I would love for the community to have a more world-oriented bent. How can we best accomplish that? Are there any concerns that anyone has? Let us know in comments!

50000 march in Ireland against IMF and EU mandated austerity cuts that hit poor worse than rich

[the_future_modernes]

Every goddamn time the IMF gets into an economy, they mandate cutting public services and privitization. Has this EVER worked?

Up to 50,000 people march in Dublin over budget cuts

Approximately 50,000 people marched in Dublin this afternoon in a protest organised by the Irish Congress of Trade Unions (Ictu) against the Government’s austerity plan.

The protest started on Wood Quay at noon, before crossing over to the north quays to Ormond Quay, continuing on to Bachelors Walk and then onto O’Connell Street, arriving at the GPO at 1pm.

Addressing the crowd on a podium at the GPO, Irish Times columnist Fintan O’Toole said the Government was doing a deal with people who had not been elected.

He said the country was paying billions to bail out the banks and the Government had declared war on the poor. He said Irish people were not subjects, but citizens, and wanted their republic back.

Ictu president Jack O'Connor told protestors the country had been brought "to its knees" by the Government and bankers.MORE

Dublin protesters march against cuts as bail-out looms

The march came as officials met to hammer out the final details of a financial bail-out

Tens of thousands of people have marched through Dublin in protest at the government's austerity programme.

Protest leaders said it was the first of many demonstrations over plans to raise taxes and cut public spending.

The austerity programme is designed to cut the Irish Republic's massive government deficit, exacerbated by the rescue of the country's banks.

The march came as officials met to hammer out the final details of a financial bail-out for the country.

The EU and the IMF are set to lend the country more than 85bn euros ($113bn; £72bn), with the terms of the deal expected to be announced on Sunday ahead of the markets re-opening on Monday.

State broadcaster RTE has reported that the interest rate to be paid on part of the loan could be as much as 6.7%, higher than the rate charged to Greece for its bail-out, which has raised concerns from opposition parties.MORE

( So why are they mad? )

Russian scientist Sergey Zimov is trying to introduce Ice Age animals to Russian steppes

[the_future_modernes]

THIS IS AWESOME!!!!!


One scientist’s hobby: recreating the ice age

CHERSKY, Russia: Wild horses have returned to northern Siberia. So have musk oxen, hairy beasts that once shared this icy land with woolly mammoths and saber-toothed cats. Moose and reindeer are here, and may one day be joined by Canadian bison and deer.

Later, the predators will come _ Siberian tigers, wolves and maybe leopards.

Russian scientist Sergey Zimov is reintroducing these animals to the land where they once roamed in millions to demonstrate his theory that filling the vast emptiness of Siberia with grass-eating animals can slow global warming.

”Some people have a small garden. I have an ice age park. It’s my hobby,” says Zimov, smiling through his graying beard. His true profession is quantum physics. .
...
 
Zimov is trying to recreate an ecosystem that disappeared 10,000 years ago with the end of the ice age, which closed the 1.8 million-year Pleistocene era and ushered in the global climate roughly as we know it. MORE

Where's my SCIENCE!!! icon?
ETA: Changed link to full AP article. Related article:Methane seeping from Siberian ice a climate concern