Today's Fresh Blogs...

• Philippines ‘off track’ on MDGs

  Published: August 18, 2007, 1:28 pm

  Tags: Health Issues, Civil Society, Governance, Gloria Macapagal Arroyo, Mdgs, Millennium Development Goals, National Economic Development Authority, Philippines, Social Watch Philippines

  midway to the 2015 deadline, civil-society organizations are already saying that the government is “off target particularly in achieving the most crucial goals. NGO leaders who

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• A Green Seal for arms control?

  Published: August 15, 2007, 6:16 am

  Tags: Civil Society, Green Marketing, Pomper, Arms Control, Green Seal, Accountability

  What do environmentalists know that the peace and security community doesn't? Well, for one thing how to use the business's community marketing machinery to support their goals. One of the biggest trends in marketing in recent years is green marketing in which businesses lay claim to environmental bona fides as a means of encouraging

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• Is there a Geneva / New York divide?

  Published: July 8, 2007, 10:30 am

  Tags: United Nations, New York, Civil Society, Mc Carthy, Negotiators, Humanitarian Impacts, Disarmament, Arms Control, Geneva, Multilateral Negotiations, Bob Dylan, Diplomacy

  Bob Dylan played a sold-out concert in Geneva recently, mixing songs from his latest album, "Modern Times," with some of his old classics, including "Like a Rolling Stone," which contains the following cryptic lyrics:"You used to ride on the chrome horse with your diplomat / who carried on his shoulder a Siamese cat..."Nobody quite knows what this

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• Growth and decline during the 2007 polls

  Published: September 5, 2007, 10:34 am

  Tags: 2007 Elections, Civil Society, 2004 Electoral Fraud, Comelec Watch, Media Issues, 2004 Elections, 2007 Elections, Comelec, Elections, Election Watchdogs, Hello Garci Tapes, Media

  THE good news is that Filipino voters are becoming more discerning and many among the mass media are improving their coverage of elections. Yet the same positive assessment cannot be said of the electoral exercise itself and the Commission on Elections (Comelec). Major players in the media community the Philippine Daily Inquirer, ABS-CBN and

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• Thinking Outside the Bomb: The Road From Oslo

  Published: September 19, 2007, 12:59 pm

  Tags: United Nations, Humanitarian Approaches, Civil Society, Ccw, Oslo Process, Cluster Munitions, Landmines, Borrie, Human Security, Anti Personnel Mines

  and donor governments and civil society. And the treaty has stigmatized mine use around the world to an impressive degree.This week, I've been participating in a round of events in Oslo to commemorate completion of the Mine Ban Treaty, all grouped around the theme of "clearing the path for a better future". It's been great to see so many

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• Re-humanize yourself: The Belgrade Conference of states affected by cluster munitions

  Published: October 5, 2007, 7:26 am

  Tags: Civil Society, Serbia, Humanitarian Impacts, Belgrade, Oslo Process, Humanitarian Action, Cluster Munitions, Borrie, Human Security, Anti Personnel Mines, Civilians, Affected States

  (CMC) - a network of civil society groups dedicated to banning these weapons - in Serbia at the Belgrade Conference of states affected by cluster munitions. I've just returned from that Conference, and thought I should offer a few impressions.The idea behind the Belgrade Conference was to allow affected countries to share their

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• Campaign vs ‘illegitimate debt’ on

  Published: October 9, 2007, 9:40 am

  Tags: Civil Society, Governance, Freedom From Debt Coalition, Illegitimate Debt, Philippines

  THE controversial $329-million National Broadband Network (NBN) project is only the latest in a series of “illegitimate debt” cases, according to the Freedom from Debt Coalition (FDC). The FDC defines illegitimate debts as those “incurred to finance flawed and anti-people development projects, loans that were conceived by

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• Debt-service cuts: Congress finally reclaiming power over the purse?

  Published: October 15, 2007, 7:14 am

  Tags: Civil Society, Congress Watch, Governance, In The News, Automatic Aprropriations, Bataan Nuclear Power Plant, Debt Service, Freedom From Debt Coalition, Hocal Incinerators, Illegitimate Debt, National Budget, Pd 1177, Philippines, Social Watch Philippines

  IN a rare assertion of its power over the purse not seen in quite a long time, the House of Representatives approved on second reading last week the proposed P1.23-trillion national budget with sizeable cuts in the country’s debt service obligations. Slashed from the budget to augment the allocations for health, education, agriculture and

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• Photo licenses 10 years on

  Published: October 16, 2007, 7:29 am

  Tags: Organised Crime, Id Card, Dia, Civil Society, Identity Fraud

  After 10 years of use as a de facto ID card, the New Zealand government has just published draft guidelines requiring that they are no longer accepted by government agencies as a 'strong' form of identification. What lesson does this offer for the future of ID cards? Putting aside the matter of principle, lets just look at the practical

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• New national hunger record belies MDG achievement

  Published: October 17, 2007, 2:48 am

  Tags: Civil Society, Governance, Arroyo Administration, Hunger, Millennium Development Goals, Philippines, Poverty, Social Weather Stations

  MIDWAY to the 2015 deadline of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), the Arroyo government reported last week that the country is well on its way to achieving its commitments, highlighted by a drastic reduction in the proportion of Filipino families living in extreme poverty. Yet a week prior to the government declaration, the results of [...]

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• Satellites of Love?

  Published: October 19, 2007, 5:48 am

  Tags: Civil Society, Darfur, Sudan, Fas, Violence, Armed Violence, Media Reports, Vertic, Accountability, Myanmar, Humanitarian Impacts, Genocide, Borrie, Human Security, Conflict

  (I can).Unsurprisingly, some civil society actors have woken up to the fact that such technologies could be helpful in trying to hold governments accountable for their actions, for instance for human rights violations or failure to protect civilians in conflict. In June of this year, for instance, Amnesty International launched a website in

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• What do survivors think of cluster munitions?

  Published: October 22, 2007, 3:21 am

  Tags: Civil Society, Handicap International, Circle Of Impact, Fatal Footprint, Humanitarian Action, Cluster Munitions, Human Security, Affected States

  Did you ever wonder what a cluster munition survivor thinks of cluster munitions? We found out a few weeks ago during training in Belgrade, Serbia, for individuals from communities affected by cluster munitions in Afghanistan, Lebanon, Serbia and Tajikistan. Their answers were stunning, and touched on devastation, the death of parents and

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• Action on cluster bombs

  Published: November 5, 2007, 3:39 am

  Tags: United Nations, Civil Society, Ccw, Oslo Process, Cluster Munitions, Multilateral Negotiations

  cause unacceptable harm to civilians.And, beginning today in Geneva, states party to the UN Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons have a round of meetings in the Palais. Today and tomorrow they will focus on implementation of two existing protocols to the CCW framework treaty - 1996 Amended Protocol II on mines and booby-traps, and 2003

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• Why is draft of ASEAN charter being kept from public?

  Published: November 7, 2007, 6:38 am

  Tags: Cross Border, Access To Information, Civil Society, In The News, Asean Charter, Association Of Southeast Asian Nations, Transparency

  WHY is a document like the proposed charter of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) being kept from the citizens of the countries that make up the regional organization? Wanting to formalize its existence, the ASEAN decided to codify its agreements in a charter, and in 2004 crafted the Vientiane Action Program, a six-year plan [...]

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• GCAP raises red alert on poverty

  Published: November 7, 2007, 3:48 am

  Tags: Civil Society, Governance, Arroyo Administration, Gcap, Hunger, Millennium Development Goals, Philippines, Poverty, Social Weather Stations

  POVERTY in the Philippines is in red alert status, according to the Global Call to Action Against Poverty (GCAP). GCAP-Philippines cited recent survey results from the Social Weather Stations (SWS), which showed that 52 percent or about nine million Filipino families rated themselves as poor. The survey was conducted from September 2 to 5, 2007.

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