Here are some of IPS’s most-read stories of the past week — and stories you shouldn’t go without reading:

ECONOMY-INDIA: Tax Haven Loot Turns Election Issue
By Ranjit Devraj
NEW DELHI (IPS) – General elections currently being contested in India have brought an unusual issue to the fore – the repatriation of more than a trillion dollars believed to have been stashed away in Swiss and other tax havens.
www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=46633

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COLOMBIA: Paramilitary Chief Says He Helped Finance Uribe's Campaign
By Constanza Vieira*
BOGOTA (IPS) – Former Colombian paramilitary chief and drug lord Diego Murillo, alias “Don Berna”, testified in a U.S. court that he helped finance President Álvaro Uribe?s first election campaign, in 2002.
ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=46600

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LIBYA: 'King of Kings' Gaddafi Tries to Flex Regional Muscles
By Michael Deibert
PARIS (IPS) – Former pariah and now Europe?s cautious partner, Libya?s leader Muammar Gaddafi seems determined to flex new-found diplomatic muscles on issues ranging from trade to regional security, North Africa observers say.
ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=46621

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CLIMATE CHANGE: Native Peoples Sound Dire Warning
By Stephen Leahy*
ANCHORAGE, Alaska (IPS) – Humanity’s hot carbon breath is not just melting the planet?s polar regions, it is disrupting natural systems and livelihoods around the world, indigenous people reported this week at a global meeting on climate change in Anchorage, Alaska.
www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=46594

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TECHNOLOGY-BRAZIL: E-Waste Can Produce Marvels
By Clarinha Glock*
PORTO ALEGRE, Brazil (IPS/IFEJ) – Using pieces from all sorts of useless equipment, students at the Computer Recovery Centre in the southern Brazilian city of Porto Alegre have put 1,700 computers into operation in three years.
ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=46631

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SOUTH AFRICA: Election Will Not Bring an End to Political Turmoil
Analysis by Christi van der Westhuizen*
CAPE TOWN (IPS) – South Africa?s fourth democratic election will not bring an end the political turmoil that has beset the country since 2007 when former president Thabo Mbeki suspended the country?s head of public prosecutions and was replaced by Jacob Zuma as leader of the ruling ANC.
ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=46603

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ISRAEL: ‘If You Don’t Know, It Didn’t Happen’
Analysis by Daan Bauwens
TEL AVIV (IPS) – Even though atrocities committed by Israeli soldiers have surfaced and the appointment of a right-wing government diminishes the chances for peace in the Middle East, no left-wing Israeli is taking to the streets.
www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=46564

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DEVELOPMENT: Asian NGOs Must Lead in Asia
By Feizal Samath
COLOMBO (IPS) – In a spirit of South-South Cooperation Asian NGOs must take the lead from international and western NGOs working in war-torn Sri Lanka and across Asia, as they understand the local dynamics and culture much more deeply than anyone else, an experienced Asian NGO leader told IPS.
www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=46577

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BRAZIL: Pilot Project Helps Men Abandon Violence
By Fabiana Frayssinet
RIO DE JANEIRO (IPS) – Some men interpret an overly long glance from another man as “a gay thing,” others as “a provocation” to fight – ideas that are part of the “machista” mindset that a government initiative in Brazil is trying to break down.
ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=46587

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GREECE: ‘Culture of Control’ Taking Over
By Apostolis Fotiadis
ATHENS (IPS) – The government of the right-wing New Democracy has announced massive security measures that legal experts warn can corrode social and political rights.
www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=46521

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DOMINICAN REPUBLIC: Church Pushes Draconian Abortion Law
By Elizabeth Eames Roebling
SANTO DOMINGO (IPS) – A truck full of female police officers, dressed in black riot protection gear, pulled up in front of the General Assembly building here to confront and control the crowd of women who had gathered on Tuesday to protest a “right to life” amendment to the Dominican constitution.
www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=46605

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