The Week with IPS

Here are some of the most-read stories of the past week — and stories you shouldn’t go without reading:

IRAQ:Fewer Deaths Bring No Reassurance
Ali al-Fadhily*
BAGHDAD – Despite claims by Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and Bush administration officials that violence in Iraq is decreasing, residents in the capital tell a different story.
www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=39993

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New Crises Sap Bush’s War on Terror
Jim Lobe
WASHINGTON – Just as the White House claims that it has finally turned the corner in what it defines as the “central front” in the war on terror — Iraq — it has found itself desperately trying to contain new crises in the war’s “periphery” stretching east to Pakistan, west to Turkey, and south to the Horn of Africa.
www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=39986

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PAKISTAN: Intelligentsia Finds Ways to Beat Emergency Rule
Beena Sarwar
KARACHI – Faced with a continuing news blackout and with street protests being met with police beatings and imprisonment, members of Pakistan’s civil society who oppose the ‘emergency’, imposed by President Gen. Pervez Musharraf a week ago, are finding alternative ways to express dissent.
www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=39990

Trouble in Pakistan – More IPS News
www.ipsnews.net/new_focus/pakistan/index.asp

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SOMALIA: “Humpty Dumpty Has Fallen Off the Wall”
Analysis by Nadja Drost
NEW YORK – Every day that gun shots ring through a Mogadishu neighbourhood, every week that an explosion rips homes into plumes of dust, and every month that thousands of civilians flee the capital, Somalia plunges deeper into crisis.
www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=39948

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AGRICULTURE: Costly Prosperity
Analysis by Mario Osava
RIO DE JANEIRO – Many of the people who are now complaining that biofuels are driving up agricultural prices fought in the past against the “deterioration of the terms of exchange,” or the devaluation of commodities with respect to manufactured goods, as a key factor in underdevelopment.
www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=40000

PARAGUAY: The Dark Side of the Soy Boom – By David Vargas
ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=39972

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TRADE-EAST AFRICA: Chaos On Eve of EPA Deadline
Analysis by Aileen Kwa
NAIROBI – On the eve of the deadline of the finalisation of the economic partnership agreement negotiations, chaos reigns. African ministers are gathering in Brussels for negotiations with the European Union. It remains to be seen whether talks will stall and be carried over to next year, or if an “EPA-lite” will be accepted.
www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=39974

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MALAYSIA: Rally Defies Police Ban to Demand Poll Reforms
Anil Netto
KUALA LUMPUR – Tens of thousands of people defied riot police, water cannon and pouring rain to march through the capital city, on Saturday, to demand electoral and other reforms and deliver a strong rebuff to Prime Minister Abdullah Badawi.
www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=40006

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MIDEAST:Palestinians Get Some Medical Care
Ramsey Ben-Achour
RAMALLAH – After packing the ambulance with medical equipment and bags full of medicine, Dr. Jameel Mashny, Dr. Rami Habash and their nurse, Maysa Youseff, all from the Palestine Medical Relief Society (PMRS), prepare themselves for the long day ahead.
www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=39934

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DOMINICAN REPUBLIC: Noel Leaves Poorest in Dire Straits
Elizabeth Eames Roebling
SANTO DOMINGO – The bus carrying relief volunteers from the Colectiva de Mujeres y Salud stopped at the flooded Bao River, about three hours’ drive from the capital, unable to cross.
www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=39998

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ARGENTINA: Identifying the Remains of the “Disappeared”
Marcela Valente
BUENOS AIRES – With backing from the state, a non-profit scientific organisation in Argentina has launched a mass campaign to collect blood samples from the families of people who fell victims to forced disappearance during the 1976-1983 dictatorship, in order to identify the remains of some 600 people and create a database.
www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=39988

LobeLog.com
IPS Washington bureau chief Jim Lobe’s take on U.S. foreign policy and the story behind the story. www.ips.org/blog/jimlobe/

And much more global news at: www.ipsnews.net/

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