As the US fosters a backlash at the UN Commission on the Status of Women, states from Lebanon to Namibia are taking more progressive positions.

When human rights gained recognition the dominant power was the state relative to the individual and citizen. Now transnational businesses have vastly greater power than both.

(Or, why is the world allowing the Rohingya to be slaughtered?) There is a genocide happening before our eyes. If only we can bear to look.

Diplomatic activity has increased. But how serious are their efforts? Will they achieve anything?

A NOREF policy brief providing a series of recommendations for the development of a peacemkaing strategy for Syria, led by the UN with support from key countries.

On too many issues of global concern, the United Nations faces gridlock. The Security Council, embodying as it does the post-war oligopoly in its permanent membership, desperately needs reform to empower the wider world and to improve its effectiveness. But those with their feet under the table are reluctant to give way.

As governments are so infrequently held accountable for their actions, is there any reason why they wouldn't try and circumvent the very laws they hold in place?

Ten years ago today in Baghdad a terror attack blasted apart the UN headquarters in Iraq... At the moment of the explosion Gil Loescher and Arthur Helton were sitting down to interview Sergio Vieira de Mello for their joint openDemocracy column....

The author who has been involved in UN electoral missions all over the world, met up with a group of colleagues in New York who worked with him in Central America. He looks back on the work of twenty years, including the ONUVEN and ONUSAL missions.

We lead this week with exciting news of a special preview of "The Exile Nation Project: An Oral History of the War on Drugs & the American Criminal Justice System.” Written, produced and directed by our very own Charles Shaw, the film puts a human face on the millions of American's subjugated by the US Government's 40 year, one trillion dollar social catastrophe ~ MW & CS

It gives me great pleasure to lead our report this week with news of the world premiere of "The Exile Nation Project: An Oral History of the War on Drugs & the American Criminal Justice System.” Written, produced and directed by our very own Charles Shaw, the film is the culmination of several months work creating an oral history that puts a human face on the millions of American's subjugated by the US Government's 40 year, one trillion dollar social catastrophe: The War on Drugs ~ MW & CS

Charles Shaw is on the road this week, working on the Unheard Voices Project, so I have the honor of leading the Front Line Report. This week we lead with a roundup of news from Mexico, and of the latest battleground in the multilateral war between drug-trafficking gangs and the authorities.