Category: News

Canada on Wednesday banned conversion therapy, which are treatments that claim to be able to change a person’s sexual orientation or identity. The law makes it a crime to subject a person of any age, consenting or not, to such treatment. So-called conversion therapies rely on the assumption that sexual orientation can be changed or […]

Police in northwestern China broke up the wedding of a 14-year-old girl whose parents allegedly tried to sell her into marriage with a stranger for a nearly $40,000 dowry, authorities said. The teenager called police in Zhongning county, Ningxia region during the wedding on November 24 to say she was being forced into the illegal […]

Islamabad, PakistanTaliban militants in Pakistan declared an end to a month-long ceasefire arranged with the aid of the Afghan Taliban, accusing the government of breaching terms including a prisoner release agreement and the formation of negotiating committees. The Pakistani Taliban, or Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), are a separate movement from the Afghan Taliban and have fought […]

New Zealand plans to outlaw smoking for the next generation so they will never be legally able to buy tobacco in the country. Under proposed new legislation, the legal age of 18 for buying tobacco will be raised progressively, Associate Health Minister Dr. Ayesha Verrall said at a news conference Thursday. “We want to make […]

International donors have agreed to transfer $280m (£210) from a frozen fund to UN food and health services in Afghanistan, the World Bank says. The country faces a deep humanitarian and economic crisis made worse by the removal of financial support after the Taliban seized power in August. The World Food Programme (WFP) warns that […]

Foreign Secretary Liz Truss has warned Russia it will face “severe economic consequences” if it invades Ukraine. She said G7 foreign ministers meeting in Liverpool this weekend would put on a show of unity and make clear such a move would be a “strategic mistake”. Ms Truss said the UK and its allies had to […]

A Brazilian court has sentenced four people to lengthy prison terms over the deaths of 242 club-goers in a fire during a party in 2013. The blaze began when members of a band performing at the Kiss nightclub, in the southern city of Santa Maria, lit flares which set light to the ceiling. There was […]