Topic: Rwanda

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Readers Write: The real definition and drivers of poverty

Letters to the Editor for the weekly print issue of November 5, 2012: Poverty is American hardly compares to poverty in Africa – in attitude and in hardship. The real cause of poverty in the US is job-killing free trade and oligarchic rule that widens the gap between rich and poor.
Change Agent Search for Common Ground uses TV soaps to promote peace

Now in its 30th year Search for Common Ground uses a variety of methods, including TV soap operas, to build peace and avoid conflict in 30 countries around the world.
There Was a Country

Chinua Achebe offers a moving personal history of the short-lived African nation of Biafra.
Gauging poverty from Appalachia to Africa

A Monitor correspondent, who grew up in West Virginia, discusses the poverty she's seen firsthand while working as a journalist in Africa.
Change Agent Ex-NASA engineer designs an app to chart water quality

John Feighery created mWater – a cell phone app that instantly records and maps the results of water-quality tests, making monitoring of water quality in developing countries quicker and easier.
Haiti bans plastic bags and styrofoam containers

Haiti's government has announced a ban on importing, manufacturing, and marketing plastic and foam containers as of Oct.1 in an effort to do away with 'rivers of debris' across the country.
Change Agent A lab uses remote sensors to measure how well aid projects work

SWEETLab places sensors on latrines, cook stoves, and water filters in the developing world to better understand how they are being used.
Interventions

Former UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan writes of decades spent pursuing the elusive goal of world peace.
Syrian crisis: the case for the US to intervene now – or not

Senate hawks urge a swift US military response to Syria's deepening conflict, citing humanitarian concerns and US security interests, including the regime's chemical weapons. Critics ask: Is it possible to end the fighting on acceptable terms?
Change Agent A modern, wired university grows in Nigeria

The American University of Nigeria provides a modern education right in the backyard of Boko Haram, Nigeria's homegrown terrorist group. One clue: The campus claims 55 percent of all the Internet traffic in Nigeria.
Congo accuses Rwanda of backing new rebellion

Congo's president has accused Rwanda of backing rebels in the east of Congo. The rebellion has forced more than 260,000 people from their homes in the past three months.
Four things Syria must do after Bashar al-Assad

It’s not too early to consider the way forward for Syria after Bashar al-Assad. Examples in other countries show that a transition will be greatly aided if Syrians can do these four things:
African Union gets a South African leader, lending the group heft

Observers hope that the long-deadlocked African Union will wield more influence with the economic and political power of South Africa behind it.
Opinion The way forward in Syria after Bashar al-Assad

Yesterday's strategic bomb attack in Damascus shows it's not too soon to consider the way forward in Syria after the rule of Bashar al-Assad. Lessons from other countries teach that Syria and the international community will have to pull together for a successful transition.
Briefing New trouble in Congo

Instability in Congo affects human rights there, and the cost of cellphones in the US.
Evidence exists to bring Syria war-crimes case: French diplomat (+video)

France's top human rights diplomat says 'the raw material is there' in the Syria conflict to refer case to the International Criminal Court at The Hague.
Thomas Lubanga: Congolese warlord first person ever sentenced by ICC (+video)

A tough ICC sentence for rebel commander Thomas Lubanga, convicted of recruiting and using child soldiers from 2002 to 2003, sets precedent for seven other pending war crimes cases.
Congo rebels take eastern towns as conflict escalates

Tens of thousands of civilians flee, as Congolese rebels take a number of towns. For now, neither the government nor renegade troops are backing down.
Difference Maker Son of an anti-Nazi hero uses family estate to teach teens

Helmuth Caspar von Moltke, son of an anti-Nazi hero, uses the family estate in Poland to teach teenagers about democracy and protecting human rights.
Opinion Why there will be no foreign military intervention in Syria

Despite the apparent failure of the meeting in Geneva over the weekend and a new Human Rights Watch report of widespread torture by the regime of Bashar al-Assad, a foreign military intervention in Syria is unlikely. In fact, there is reason to doubt that Washington really wants Assad to fall.
Africa Monitor Is there a "Kivu conspiracy" to undermine Congo? Hardly

Guest blogger Laura Seay, during visit to the Congolese city of Goma, looks into allegations that the ongoing rebellion of Bosco Ntaganda is a conspiracy to undermine Congolese control.
Terrorism & Security US: Syria plotting more massacres, but intervening would make it worse

At a State Department briefing yesterday, a reporter asked why the US would not intervene if it knew massacres were likely to occur. The response: 'Do you have a specific proposal in mind?'
Keep Calm As Europe peers into economic chasm, Africa's economy is rising

Reports by the African Development Bank, World Bank, and McKinsey show how Africa continues to offer a bright spot in the global economy.
The Monitor's View Syria massacre: a moment of truth to end the lies

The massacre of women and children in Houla, Syria, finally forces Russia to stop defending the denials of Bashar al-Assad in the killing of innocent civilians by Syrian forces.
Chapter & Verse FC Barcelona stars help to bring e-books to Africa

Worldreader, a nonprofit literacy organization, is using messages from Barcelona soccer stars to help distribute one million digital books to children living in sub-Saharan Africa.