Feed aggregator

When asked about the matter, a European Commission source told Euractiv that they could not disclose the name of the company at this stage of the investigation

"We are starting to doubt ourselves," said a keynote speaker

REPORT on EU political strategy on Latin America
Committee on Foreign Affairs
Davor Ivo Stier

Source : © European Union, 2025 - EP

Within hours of the US proposal, Brussels and EU capitals supported the ceasefire prospect and reiterated its backing for a two-state solution

Amir Khan wants to build a legacy outside the ring as a boxing promoter as he brings a professional fight night to Nigeria.

Amir Khan wants to build a legacy outside the ring as a boxing promoter as he brings a professional fight night to Nigeria.

Voir en ligne : https://www.ubabenin.com/uba-b-mo

Written by Stefano De Luca and Clément Evroux.

Satellite services play a key role across our economies – from enabling Earth observation to ensuring the resilience of several sectors such as mobility, finance and defence – thanks to navigation, timing and positioning systems. In the future, they are expected increasingly to provide connectivity services, including coverage in remote areas and secure connectivity for public authorities.

This situation comes with a set of threats and challenges. While the number of satellites in orbit is growing exponentially, to more than 10 000 in 2024, the congestion of orbits increases the risk of disruption through collision. In addition, geopolitical tensions are materialising in space, highlighting countries’ satellite sovereign capabilities and cybersecurity risks there. On the one hand, the weaponisation of the space domain adds further pressure to the risks of space congestion. On the other hand, space systems also face challenges on Earth, as they are underpinned by a complex supply chain, which requires sourcing of both raw materials and several technological components – from chips to launchers.

Against this backdrop, the EU is harnessing its space policy to develop, deploy and curate its space assets to deliver key services: positioning navigation and timing (Galileo), Earth observation (Copernicus), and secure connectivity (IRIS²). The EU’s space policy also relies on the single market and EU industrial policy to ensure a resilient space supply chain, as well as space industry competitiveness. The proposed EU space act is an important step in this regard.   

This briefing outlines the basics of satellite functioning and functionalities, presents the main challenges the EU space sector faces and the main EU space initiatives, and identifies possible related EU policy developments.

Read the complete briefing on ‘Satellites: State of play and challenges for the EU’ Initiative‘ in the Think Tank pages of the European Parliament.

Der Plan sieht vor, Hunderte Milliarden Euro eingefrorener russischer Zentralbankguthaben in der EU zu mobilisieren, um das ukrainische Haushaltsdefizit zu decken und langfristige Sicherheitsbedürfnisse zu finanzieren.

Participants at the Non-Governmental Organizations Forum meeting held in Huairou, China, as part of the United Nations Fourth World Conference on Women held in Beijing, China, on 4-15 september 1995. Credit: UN Photo/Milton Grant

By Naureen Hossain
UNITED NATIONS, Sep 30 2025 (IPS)

Thirty years since the UN Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing, the resolve that defined and united the world toward a global agenda for gender equality make it just as relevant in 2025.

The Beijing Conference represents a turning point for the global movement in gender equality. It is marked by the adoption of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action, which is still held up as a landmark document in presenting a comprehensive blueprint to achieve gender equality.

The Beijing Conference was just “one stop in a long and continuing journey of feminist advocacy,” said Sia Nowrojee, a Kenyan women’s rights advocate with more than thirty years’ experience.

“Even though it’s thirty years later, it’s absolutely relevant. It was the culmination of twenty years of advocacy and gender equality.” Nowrojee is the UN Foundation’s Associate Vice President of their Girls and Women Strategy division.

The Beijing Conference was the first time that the international community integrated gender equality into the global development and rights agenda. It was recognition that securing the rights and dignities for all women and girls would be integral to achieving widespread development. This was key for the countries that had emerged in the post-colonial era.

Sia Nowrojee, UN Foundation’s Associate Vice President of Girls and Women Strategy. Credit: UN Foundation

The leadership of advocates from the Global South was instrumental to the Beijing PoA. Representatives from Africa, Asia, and Latin America pushed for the measures that make the framework as inclusive as it is. Nowrojee gave the example of girls’ rights being recognized thanks to the efforts of African feminists in the lead-up to Beijing.

Hibaaq Osman, a Somali human rights activist and founder of El-Karama, considers that the Global South activists had been uniquely prepared to participate as they had lived through their countries’ great political upheavals against colonialism and racism.

Osman attended Beijing 1995 as part of the Center of Strategic Initiatives of Women, a civil society network.

Hibaaq Osman, a Somali human rights activist and founder of El-Karama. Credit: UN Foundation

“For me, as a young woman, I was shocked by the things that I heard. I was raised to believe that everything was a privacy. But to hear a woman speaking for herself and sharing things that I never thought you could share with others, including violence against women… It absolutely opened my eyes and made me see, ‘Oh my god, I can actually share things with other women,’” Osman told IPS.

For Osman, the Beijing conference represented the possibilities of what could be achieved through a shared agenda and a shared sense of hope. The unique energy from that conference drove her advocacy work through groups like the Strategic Initiative for Women in the Horn of Africa (SIHA) and then El-Karama, which is working to end violence against women in the Arab region and South Sudan.

General view of the opening session of the Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing. Credit: UN Photo/Milton Grant

Beijing 1995 also provided the expectation of accountability from governments and policy makers if they did not implement the PoA. “That had never happened before. There was a mechanism for the first time…,” said Osman. “You can hold governments and policymakers accountable. But you also have the connection with grassroots. That it was no longer the individual woman that could claim that she was the leader, but having accountability to your own people, I think that whole thing was fantastic.”

“I think the legacy of Beijing 1995 honestly, it gave us a legacy of getting out of our corners and just wide open to the rest of the women. And I think that vision, that framework is still working.”

Delegates working late into the night to draft the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action. Credit: UNDP/Milton Grant

The success of the Women’s Conferences also demonstrated the UN’s role as a space to build up the gender equality movement, Nowrojee remarked. The UN has also served as a platform for emerging countries to raise their issues to the international community and to shape global agendas on their terms.

Prior to Beijing, the UN World Conference on Women had previously been held in Nairobi (1985), Copenhagen (1980) and Mexico City (1975). These were also key forums for people from all parts of the world to build relationships and for there to be a “cross-pollination of ideas and experiences”, laying down the groundwork for what was later achieved in Beijing.

Nowrojee was 18 years old when she attended the Nairobi 1985 Conference as part of a school/youth delegation. The experience was formative in listening to women’s activists from the region impart their wisdom and insights.

“To see the world’s women come to my home and talk about the fact that we mattered was life-changing for me,” Nowrojee said. “I made friends who I still work with and love and see today. And I think there is that sort of personal part, which is both personally sustaining, but it’s a critical part of feminist movement building.”

Each conference built up momentum that saw no sign of slowing down. Osman and Nowrojee explained that as gains were being made at local, national and global levels, this encouraged those in the movement to act with urgency and go further. This provided them the spaces to learn how to refine the messages for local contexts.

Delegates at the Fourth UN World Conference on Women in Beijing 1995. Credit: UNDPI /UN Women

The gains towards gender equality should be noted: the codification of women’s rights around the world, their increased participation in politics and in peace negotiations. Evidence has shown that investing in women’s participation in society through health, education and employment leads to economic growth and prosperity. More women in the workforce mean greater economic gains and stability. Increased social protections for women lead to more stability in communities.

And yet, there was backlash to the momentum. Recent years have seen the rise of anti-rights and anti-gender movements gain greater traction, combined with increasing attempts to strip women of their rights. UN Women has warned that one in four countries are reporting a backlash to women’s rights.

Nowrojee remarked that the autocratic leaders that champion these movements target women’s rights because it threatens their own agenda. “If you are silencing half the human family, and you are hampering their ability to make decisions about their bodies, to participate in political process… these are very, very effective ways of undermining democracy, development, peace and the achievement of all the goals and values that we hold dear.”

“They understand that if you bring women down, you are bringing society down, because women are the core of society,” Osman added.

The modern movements are also well-funded and well-organized. But there is an irony to it in that they use the same tactics that feminist movements have been using for decades by organizing at the grassroots level before moving their influence up to the national level and beyond. But this should not be where activists fall to despair. Instead they should understand, Osman and Nowrojee remarked, that women in this space already know what actions need to be taken to regain lost momentum.

“I’m sure that Sia and I and many, many others who were part of that are also thinking about today and what’s happening, and we know the space for civil society is shrinking,” Osman said. “The space for democracy, human rights, justice, reproductive rights, for all of that, there is absolutely a rollback, But it’s not going to delay us. We are just going to be more sophisticated and ask ourselves “Where are the blocks, how do we build… diverse constituencies?”… So it is hard, but we are not slowing down whatsoever.”

Today, it may seem the pursuit of gender equality is an ongoing struggle that faces the threat of autocratic movements that sow distrust and division. For the people who championed the women’s rights movement and can recall a time before the Beijing PoA, they are all too aware of what is at stake. The leaders in modern movements today need to look back to the past to take lessons, and to take courage.

IPS UN Bureau Report

 

Follow @IPSNewsUNBureau
!function(d,s,id){var js,fjs=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0],p=/^http:/.test(d.location)?'http':'https';if(!d.getElementById(id)){js=d.createElement(s);js.id=id;js.src=p+'://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js';fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js,fjs);}}(document, 'script', 'twitter-wjs');   Related Articles

• UNICEF Climate Advocate Urges World Leaders To ‘Include Children’ in Climate Discussions
• Active Citizens, Africa, Asia-Pacific, Child Labour, Civil Society, Crime & Justice, Development & Aid, Editors' Choice, Featured, Gender, Gender Violence, Global, Headlines, Human Rights, Human Trafficking, Population, Sustainable Development Goals, TerraViva United Nations, Youth Human Rights Ending Child Marriage Needs a Culture of Accountability, Respect for the Rule of Law

The watchdog said Red.es unfairly favoured contracts for entrepreneur Carlos Barrabés, a businessman linked to Sánchez’s wife

La présidente de la Commission européenne a déclaré mardi 30 septembre que l’Ukraine allait bientôt recevoir 2 milliards d’euros pour l’achat de drones, sans toutefois préciser d’où proviendrait cet argent.

The post Ursula von der Leyen annonce que l’Ukraine recevra bientôt 2 milliards d’euros pour l’achat de drones appeared first on Euractiv FR.

Le président Donald Trump a annoncé un plan en 20 points pour la paix à Gaza et au Moyen-Orient après avoir rencontré le Premier ministre israélien Benjamin Netanyahu.

Voir en ligne : https://www.ubabenin.com/2025/09/22...

Le Bénin a signé des accords d'exemption de visa avec six pays et établi des relations avec Trinité-et-Tobago, et Palaos. Ces accords ont été conclus en marge de la 80è session des Nations Unies tenue du 9 au 23 septembre 2025 à New-York.

En marge de la 80è session des Nations unies tenue du 9 au 23 septembre 2025 à New-York, le Bénin a conclu un accord aérien avec le Luxembourg et des accords d'exemption de visa avec six autres pays.

Les exemptions de visa ont été signés avec les Émirats arabes unis, le Kenya, le Tchad, Antigua-et-Barbuda, les Îles Marshall et les États fédérés de Micronésie.
Avec les Emirats Arabes Unis par exemple, l'accord d'exemption mutuelle de visa concerne les détenteurs de passeport diplomatique et de service.

Des relations diplomatiques officielles ont été également établies avec la Trinité-et-Tobago ainsi qu'avec Palaos.

La délégation béninoise a été conduite par le ministre des Affaires étrangères Olushegun Adjadi Bakari. Le chef de la diplomatie béninoise s'est entretenu avec ses homologues de l'Azerbaïdjan, du Venezuela, des Maldives, du Burundi et de la Mauritanie.

M. M.

Voir en ligne : https://www.ubabenin.com/2025/09/22...

A civil society group has raised concerns about who is writing AI standards for the EU's flagship AI Act

Months of talks collapsed over how to codify Europe’s diverse döner traditions

Le Centre National d'Investigations Numériques (CNIN) met en garde les utilisateurs contre la plateforme frauduleuse ‘'Pépite''.

L'application ‘' Pépite'' présente un danger potentiel pour les utilisateurs. Elle ne doit pas être téléchargée.

Les utilisateurs sont appelés à faire preuve de vigilance et s'abstenir de partager les liens relatifs à la plateforme, met en garde le Centre National d'Investigations Numériques (CNIN) dans une publication en date du 29 septembre.

Le CNIN rappelle que les citoyens qui font la promotion de la plateforme ‘'Pépite'' répondront de leur agissement devant la justice.
M. M.