by Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy, PBS, USA - The city of Peshawar is on high alert. The Taliban are closing in, regularly attacking police convoys, kidnapping diplomats, and shooting foreigners. The fighting across this volatile region has driven thousands of families from their homes and many have found shelter in Peshawar.

by Golnaz Esfandiari, Radio Free Europe, Czech Republic - More than 200 women, mostly students, held a protest on April 15 in Kabul against a controversial Afghan law that imposes restrictions on Shi'ite women.

by Lisa Vetten and Sally Shackleton, Pambazuka, Kenya - Despite studies which suggest that as many as one in two women in some parts of South Africa are affected by domestic violence, political parties in South Africa lack concrete, practical strategies to address violence against women.

by Markéta Hulpachová, Prague Post, Czech Republic - When Moldovan citizen Stela Brailean, 23, convoked a peaceful demonstration at the gates of her Prague 6 embassy April 9 to protest against government-ordained crackdowns in her homeland, the consulate responded by summoning a dozen city police to the site.

by Jill Replogle, Time, USA - Guatemala has long been a drug transshipment point between South and North America. But only in recent years have investigators begun to see how firmly a narco-economy is taking hold there, which is always bad news for small, poor and corrupt countries like Guatemala.

by Anna Malpas, Moscow Times, Russia - The case of 3-year-old Elise Andre, who has been caught in a brutal dispute between her Russian mother and French father, highlights the lack of transnational agreements about custody of children with dual citizenship when their parents' marriages break up.

by Madeline Ostrander, Yes!, USA - The Mortenson family is part of a growing number of ranchers who see healthy food production as part of an ecosystem, shared with plants, animals, and insects.

by Kamila Hyat, The News, Pakistan - From Swat, where the ANP "deal" with the men of Maulana Fazaullah has meant they have effectively won in the area, the Taliban have fanned out to neighbouring Buner and Dir. Their promises to quit the area have not been kept.

by Lale Sariibrahimoglu, Today's Zaman, Turkey - It's no secret that Turkey has a serious problem internalizing the concept of democracy, and this is the main reason why we have moved slowly in the adoption of European Union criteria that would install democratic standards.

by Kim Sengupta, Independent, UK - Air strikes and artillery barrages have taken a heavy toll among the most vulnerable of the Iraqi people, with children and women forming a disproportionate number of the dead.

by Marina Litvinsky, IPS, Italy - The international community must act immediately to resolve the political and humanitarian crises facing Sudan, said a panel of leading Sudan experts at a briefing here Tuesday, and ensure that any peace process formally include women’s input.

by Juliette Jowit, Guardian, UK - At least two organic farmers a week are leaving the movement as consumer demand for premium food stagnates and costs rise.

by Megan Tady, Internet for Everyone, USA - With high-speed Internet – or broadband – costing $40 to $60 per month, many people in Azusa can’t afford the connection or a computer. Azusa, with its primarily Latino population, has a poverty rate of 18 percent, higher than the state average.

by Tashi Dema, Kuensel, Bhutan - A six-hour climb from Bhurchu, about 94 km away from Dagana proper, up on a hill, is Phuensumgang community primary school.

by Harinder Baweja, Tehelka, India - If there is consensus in Pakistan, it is on the issue of how Pakistan’s support to the US is now leading to the country itself imploding. In fighting America’s war, Pakistan finds itself at war with itself.

by Madhusree Chatterjee, Thai Indian News, Thailand - The 800-year-old Tibetan Drukpa lineage of Buddhism - based in Nepal and practised in Bhutan and India - is empowering women, reviving the ancient tradition of women masters and monks that the Buddha encouraged.

by Nthateng Mhlambiso, Behind the Mask, South Africa - When sexual orientation was included in the South African Constitution, the gay community never thought that three years down the line, they would still be verbally harassed, fired from jobs, raped with the aim to make them heterosexual and worse, murdered just for being involved with their same sex partners.

by Olivia Snaije, Daily Star, Lebanon - Every once in a while a project so successfully portrays the universality of human emotion that it is both admirable and timeless. "Open Shutters Iraq" is one such project.

by Cynthia Tucker, Atlanta Journal-Constitution, USA - These mass shootings are a form of madness, but what’s even more insane is our passive reaction. We shrug our shoulders, then turn the conversation to Octomom Nadya Suleman or North Carolina’s triumph over Michigan State in college basketball’s biggest game.

by Michaela Stanková, Slovak Spectator, Slovakia - Although gender equality, or rather inequality, is definitely not topic number one on the agenda of Slovak politicians, the social reality shows that gender issues are beginning to find their place in public discussion.

by Leela Jacinto, France 24, France - Anti-Communist protests broke out in Moldova following high-tech activism via Twitter, Facebook and SMS messages. But with police crackdowns and nearly 200 arrests, organisers now have to undertake low-tech organising.

by Aunohita Mojumdar, Eurasia Net, USA - While some international observers characterized the draft bill as an aberration in Afghanistan’s democratization process, critics insist Afghan President Hamid Karzai’s administration is willing to endorse discrimination in order to bolster its standing in conservative constituencies.