Pope’s South American trip: defending the poor and the planet
VATICAN CITY (Reuters) – Pope Francis sets out on Sunday to three of South America’s poorest and smallest countries, taking his message of solidarity with the downtrodden to prisoners, peasants, garbage pickers and indigenous people.
Eight dead in new Saudi-led strikes on Yemen’s Sanaa: agency
SANAA (Reuters) – Saudi-led air strikes killed eight people on Thursday in Yemen’s capital Sanaa, residents and a news agency reported, the first such attacks after a lull of several days.
U.N. rights body calls for end to child and forced marriage
NEW YORK (Thomson Reuters Foundation) – The United Nations Human Rights Council adopted a resolution on Thursday calling for an end to child, early and forced marriage, and recognizing child marriage as a violation of human rights, a move campaigners w…
Scapegoated faith healers needed in Sierra Leone health system: report
LONDON (Thomson Reuters Foundation) – Traditional healers were blamed for worsening the spread of Ebola in Sierra Leone, but they need to be included in any plan to improve the country’s healthcare and prevent such crises in future, researchers said on…
U.N. talks on Libya stumble as rival government postpones participation
RABAT (Reuters) – U.N.-brokered talks between Libya’s two rival governments hit a setback on Thursday when one of the sides stayed away from the negotiations in Morocco, saying it needed more time for consultations.
Mexican TV anchor Zabludovsky, symbol of government spin, dies at 87
MEXICO CITY (Reuters) – Influential Mexican journalist Jacobo Zabludovsky, seen for years by critics as an unofficial mouthpiece for the government, died on Thursday morning after suffering a stroke in hospital.
North Korean defector lifts lid on world’s most secret state
LONDON (Thomson Reuters Foundation) – As a schoolgirl in North Korea, Hyeonseo Lee was forced to watch executions, denounce her friends for fabricated transgressions and dig tunnels in case of a nuclear attack.
Civilians in Yemen’s Aden struggle to survive fighting, shortages: Red Cross
GENEVA (Reuters) – Civilians struggling to survive street battles and Saudi-led air strikes in Yemen’s southern port city of Aden are also facing shrinking supplies of food and fuel, a senior official from the International Committee of the Red Cross (…
Somalia reached ‘tipping point,’ can secure peace, U.N. official says
NAIROBI (Thomson Reuters Foundation) – Somalia has made “remarkable” progress in the last two years and has reached a “tipping point” where it can secure peace, the chief United Nations official in Somalia said on Thursday.
Gulf states tighten security for frightened Shi’ites after mosque blasts
DUBAI (Reuters) – It may have been a prank, albeit a malevolent one, or a genuine threat of violence, when flyers featuring the Islamic State flag were placed near a Shi’ite Muslim mosque in Bahrain this week.
