Sight-Seeing: Our church suspended in-person worship until 2021. This one question sealed the deal
ANDY STANLEY, founder and senior pastor of North Point Ministries in Atlanta, Georgia, looks – in an article published by Religion News Service, writes about why his network of churches decided to keep the doors closed in Atlanta until next year…
From disease to bushfires, Australia’s iconic koalas face bleak future
Kanangra-Boyd National Park, New South Wales, AustraliaReuters At work, Morgan Philpott cares for sick children. In his off-hours the Australian paediatric nurse turns his attention to an equally defenceless group: unwell koalas. “They really run the risk of becoming extinct inside our lifetime,” Philpott said of the New South Wales koala population at an animal hospital […]
Ethiopia hunts for children forced to work, marry during pandemic
Addis Ababa, EthiopiaThomson Reuters Foundation Ethiopia has set up a network of committees to identify children forced into work or marriage during the coronavirus pandemic and to ensure schools are safe to re-open this week although campaigners fear it will hard to reverse the damage done. Yohannes Wogasso, school improvement program director at the Ministry […]
Top UK bishops slam “disastrous” bill as Brexit talks teeter
London, UKAP The UK’s most senior Anglican bishops warned Monday that legislation breaching part of the Brexit divorce agreement the government signed with the European Union will set a “disastrous precedent” and could undermine peace in Northern Ireland. In a letter published in the Financial Times, the top archbishops in England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland […]
Global coronavirus cases surpass the 40 million milestone
Reuters Worldwide coronavirus cases crossed 40 million on Monday, according to a Reuters tally, as the onset of winter in the northern hemisphere fuelled a resurgence in the spread of the disease. The Reuters tally is based on official reporting by individual countries. Experts believe the true numbers of both cases and deaths are likely […]
WHO names independent body to investigate Congo sex abuse claims
Dakar, SenegalThomson Reuters Foundation The World Health Organization said last week it was setting up a seven-person independent commission to investigate claims of sexual exploitation and abuse by aid workers during the recent Ebola outbreak in Democratic Republic of Congo. In an investigation published last month by the Thomson Reuters Foundation and The New Humanitarian, […]
Dreams dashed: Malawi migrants return empty-handed from South Africa
Blantyre, MalawiThomson Reuters Foundation Siphat Simali imagined that when she finally got back to Malawi she would return with pride and enough earnings from South Africa to support her two children and start a small business. Instead, the 28-year-old former domestic worker was bussed home empty-handed and shamefaced, one of a thousand to return last […]
Tunisian court rules that 81-year-old can drop slave name
Tunis, TunisiaThomson Reuters Foundation A Tunisian court has allowed an 81-year-old man to remove a word that marked him out as descended from slaves from his name, in the country’s first ruling of its kind, his lawyer said. Tunisia was one of the first countries to abolish slavery in 1846, but critics say it has […]
Traffickers profiting as pandemic makes crime harder to crack, UN warns
London, UKThomson Reuters Foundation Human traffickers are capitalising on the coronavirus pandemic to target people ranging from jobless migrants to out-of-school children, two United Nations specialists said, warning that the fallout from COVID-19 had driven the crime further underground. The global economic slowdown has left countless people jobless, desperate and at risk of exploitation, while […]
Mozambique: Virus fears as conflict fuels overcrowding, hunger
TAVARES CEBOLA, of Thomson Reuters Foundation, reports from Maputo on how the ongoing conflict in Mozambique’s north has left families in a state of uncertainty…