Women in North Africa have made tremendous progress in promoting and upholding their rights. Women in this region—commonly known as the Maghreb—are at the forefront of the Arab world in terms of individual rights and gender equality, and constitute models for other Arab women to follow. A number of

A million people around the world are marching for peace. In the past few weeks alone, they walked through the streets of Sarajevo, Zagreb and Gendema, on the Sierra Leone-Liberia border. At the same time, halfway around the world, others marched in Mexico City.
Next on the agenda? New York, Paris

During her recent visit to Pakistan, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton emphasised the need to foster a relationship of respect between the United States and Pakistan. Although Pakistan's civilian government and military establishment are closely allied with the United States in efforts to stop A

In the immediate aftermath of the 5 November Fort Hood killings, some media commentators, alerted by gunman Major Dr. Nidal Malik Hasan's Muslim name, immediately described the murders as a manifestation of his religious beliefs, reinforcing many Americans' fears about Islam. In a moment like this o

In Thailand, more than 3 million people are living with diabetes. There is an urgent need to scale up the diabetes prevention and education, says Wittaya Kaewparadai, Minister of Public Health, Thailand.
According to the International Diabetes Federation (IDF), diabetes education and prevention is

The international system is spinning to please part of the world. A great number of western people simply call it political correctness. Others, including myself, consider it attacking certain beliefs, or simply attacking Christianity.
In the beginning of October, the United Nations Human rights co

GROWING up in Zimbabwe, diabetes (a polygenic disease characterized by abnormally high glucose levels in the blood) was something that the old people always talked about, and the fear of the disease grew over me like a giant baobab.
To describe a person with diabetes, the old people would say in lo

For culture vultures, it borders on the banal to say that Iran deserves attention for a number of things that have nothing to do with nuclear programmes or the controversial attitudes of its head of state.
High-profile filmmakers; a vibrant modern literary scene that has produced works as diverse

"Where are the moderate voices from the Arab world?"
This common lament often leads to nostalgic evocations of the Golden Age of Islam. US President Barack Obama recently harked back to this period of Islamic enlightenment, innovation and tolerance in his June 2009 Cairo speech, in which he attempt

In the years since the terrorist attacks that shook Casablanca on 16 May 2003, a number of observers posited a causal relationship between the existence of slums and the unleashing of terrorist violence based on a warped interpretation of the Qur'an. According to them, social deprivation is the idea

I attended my first Reading Abrahamic Scriptures Together (RAST) session in September 2008, during the first month of my doctoral studies in Islamic religion. RAST is a group that meets twice a month to read and discuss a theme or figure in the Hebrew Bible, the New Testament and the Qur'an. A frien

US President Barack Obama is currently being attacked by friend and foe alike for his willingness to seek common ground on issues ranging from healthcare to North Korea.
"The common ground is not always the high ground", writes Leon Wieseltier in the New Republic. "It informs the other side that w

My generation grew up at a time when colonial hang up was at its peak. Our older generation had been slaves and had a huge inferiority complex of the British. The school I went to was similar to all elite schools in Pakistan. Despite gaining independent, they were, and still are, producing replicas

The timing for the screening of an environment documentary - 'Negotiating Justice' - could not have been more appropriate. The film, which talks about India's negotiating position in crucial Copenhagen meet, has been nominated for Fifth CMS Vatavaran Wildlife and Environment Award - popular as India

Access to justice is a major concern in Pakistan. Pakistan was ranked 134 in the world, lower than Rwanda and Libya, in the 2008 annual Corruption Perception Index released by Transparency International. In fact, one reason some communities in the North West Frontier Province cautiously welcomed the