-The Hindu Ecosystem restoration and relationship between biodiversity and climate change to be discussed The difficult task of mobilising financial resources for achieving biodiversity targets expeditiously became the running theme at the 11th meeting of the Conference of the Parties (COP-11) to the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), represented by over 170 countries, which began here on Monday. Union Environment and Forests Minister Jayanthi Natarajan, who assumed charge as president of COP-11 for...

-The Times of India India, dubbed 'the melting pot of Cultural Diversity', is also home to the world's 11th largest population of 'Internally Displaced People' (IDP). These people are forced to relocate fearing religious, ethnic or other persecution in conflict-induced situations. India and Turkey are the only 'stable' country in the list of 12 nations which have witnessed forced migration of a million or more. Others are either ravaged by ongoing...

-The Hindu Let us begin by listening to Mira’s story. When I learnt that I have been granted admission in the college of my choice, fear of being part of the “rest of the world” gripped me. Though confident about my academic abilities, I was terrified at the thought of how the “others” would react to me: a cerebral palsy wheelchair user with a speech difficult to comprehend and a drooling mouth....

-The Telegraph Unesco has declared the Western Ghats a World Heritage site, capping a six-year campaign, but another Indian nomination on the “hill forts of Rajasthan” tripped because of inadequacies in documentation. The recognition for the ghats came despite a recommendation against their inclusion by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), an advisory panel that assesses entries for special ecological zones. The ICUN concluded that the five states through which the...

Eminent journalist Dileep Padgaonkar who headed the group of three Central interlocutors for Jammu and Kashmir said on Thursday that the thrust of their report was to empower the people of Jammu and Kashmir so that they were able to exercise their civil and political rights in full measure. The 176-page report of the group of Central interlocutors was uploaded on the website of Union Home Ministry on Thursday, seven months...