UN : HRC establishes probe to investigate violations in Palestine & Israel (PRIV)
(Kanaga Raja, Geneva)
The UN Human Rights Council on Thursday decided to urgently establish an ongoing independent, international commission of inquiry to investigate all alleged violations and abuses of human rights in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, and in Israel, leading up to and since 13 April 2021.

Trade : Dim prospects for outcome on farm subsidies at MC12 (PRIV)
(D. Ravi Kanth, Washington DC)
Members have offered sharply divergent views and conflicting narratives on what needs to be addressed in the unfinished Doha farm trade negotiations on trade-distorting domestic support at the WTO's 12th ministerial conference (MC12) to be held in Geneva end-November, said people familiar with the development.

Africa : COVID-19 widens learning gap for girls in rural Ghana (PRIV)
(IPS, Accra)
Seventeen-year-old Muniratu Adams, a form two student of the Jeyiri D/A Junior High School at Funsi in the Wa East District of the Upper West Region of Ghana, is fortunate to have returned to school this January after the long COVID-19 shutdown.

Opinion : To beat COVID, beat HIV & beat inequality, find the money (PRIV)
(IPS, Geneva)
In this time of intersecting crises - the Covid crisis, the HIV crisis, the inequality crisis, and more - progress on all these crises is being blocked by another crisis: finance.