Gaza counts its dead as Israel plans invasion
Gaza suffered its bloodiest day since Israel launched a military offensive in the Hamas-controlled enclave, with a sharp escalation in the ferocity of attacks from both sides amid frenzied last-minute diplomacy to try and forestall an Israeli ground assault.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed a “significant expansion” of Israel’s military onslaught, even as an Israeli envoy was reported to be travelling to Cairo for ceasefire talks with Egyptian mediators. Nabeel Sha’ath, a senior Fatah official, was dispatched to Gaza by Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas to intercede with the leaders of the rival Hamas group.
US police in high jinks as marijuana is legalised
A mirthful online guide to marijuana use, put together by police in Seattle, has become an internet hit as the authorities in Washington state gear up for the changes brought about by Initiative 502 – the election-day ballot measure that legalised the drug.
The "Marijwhatnow?" post on the Seattle Police Department's Blotter blog attempts to explain the do's and don'ts under the new measure, which comes into force on 6 December. Employing language that would no doubt be appreciated by a potentially stupefied audience, it has generated nearly 30,000 Facebook "likes", with questions such as: "Will police officers be able to smoke marijuana?" Answer: "As of right now, no. This is still a very complicated."
DEVELOPMENT AID
Donors shy away from toilets
Two and a half billion people do not have access to clean and safe toilets. Yet aid agencies are struggling to find funds for sanitation and hygiene projects.
You can't be too picky when you're in a war or crisis zone. Sometimes, there's only enough time to dig a narrow trench: a make-shift squat toilet for up to 15 people.
"We're always lagging behind when it comes to humanitarian aid," Paul Shenahan told DW.
Shenahan coordinates humanitarian operations in the fields of water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) for the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF). "Toilets are the most expensive and time-consuming of all humanitarian aid operations," he said.
Integral to disaster relief
Shanahan said sanitation is an extremely important part of humanitarian disaster relief.
"Human excrements may be infectious, so they have to be properly disposed of," he said, adding that diseases can spread quickly, particularly in cramped refugee and transit camps. Cholera epidemics and life-threatening diarrhea are a constant danger.
Aid agencies' tend to dig deep pits and cover them with wooden planks with a hole in them. The toilets are then sheltered from sight by tarpaulin or timber planks, at a safe distance from the refugees' tents.
Rwanda, Uganda and Burundi involvement alleged in DRC
Kendra Nordin, Rebecca Byerly, Isabelle de Pommereau, Sophie Arie, Debra Bruno, Takehiko Kambayashi, Bilbo Poynter, and Taylor Barnes
1. A bike as economic engine
F.K. Day, United States
Life in rural Zambia has improved dramatically for dairy farmer Cecil Hankambe. He has doubled his milk sales, purchased a farm, and earned enough money to send his children to school. He still milks the same cow and travels the same rugged roads to the local dairy co-op. The only difference now: Instead of lugging a heavy jug on foot, he pedals a bicycle.
Mr. Hankambe rides a Buffalo, a bike so sturdy and basic that its steel frame can carry up to 220 pounds and be repaired with a rock. Instead of delivering only seven to 10 liters of milk a day, Hankambe can now transport 15 to 20 liters to a chilling station before it spoils, boosting his profit.
In sign of growing clout, Brazil’s corn helps hold up U.S. market
SAO PAULO — As U.S. cornfields withered under drought conditions last summer, Brazil’s once-empty Cerrado region produced a bumper crop of the grain, helping feed livestock on U.S. farms and ease a drought-related spike in prices.
The U.S. imports of Brazilian corn were small by world standards. But they are rising fast, and they mark just one element of the increasingly complex and sometimes contentious relations between the world’s agricultural superpower and its fast-growing competitor amid shifts in the global economy.
Starting at zero in 2010, Brazilian corn exports to the United States are on pace to exceed $10 million this year and are bound to rise as farmers here expand planting and more corn is funneled to nonfood uses, such as ethanol production. Brazil is expected next year to dethrone the United States as the world’s largest producer of soybeans. With so much land available for cultivation, that status will probably become permanent.
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