Feed aggregator

In Eschlikon wurde am Dienstagmorgen ein 47-Jähriger tot in einem Schacht gefunden. Laut Polizei stürzte er beim Bergen eines Gegenstands tödlich. Es gibt keine Anzeichen auf Fremdeinwirkung.

Das Trinkwasser in der Thurgauer Gemeinde Stettfurt ist verunreinigt. Auf dem Gemeindegebiet wurden mehrere Krankheitsfälle gemeldet. Aktuell wird überprüft, ob Symptome wie Durchfall und Erbrechen mit den Bakterien im Wasser zusammenhängen.

À la veille du début du mois sacré de Ramadan, l’Algérie profite d’un temps globalement stable et ensoleillé sur une grande partie du territoire. Le […]

L’article Prévisions météo en Algérie ce mercredi 18 février : vents violents persistants dans ces wilayas  est apparu en premier sur .

Im Spital Bülach hilft Labrador «Oriana» Patientinnen und Patienten, Stress und Ängste abzubauen. Der speziell ausgebildete Sozialhund darf sogar auf die Intensivstation und bringt Trost und Normalität in den Spitalalltag.

In Bivio GR steht der Skilift Tua wegen Schneemangel auf der Kippe. Eine Investition von 1,3 Millionen Franken für die Beschneiung soll das Skigebiet am Julierpass retten – ohne fremde Geldgeber.

Bei Bettmeralp ist im Skigebiet ein Pistenbully verunfallt. Die Kantonspolizei Wallis hat Kenntnis von dem Vorfall.

Seit dem 1. Januar 2026 funktionieren im Porsche 911 von Gilberto G. die Connect-Dienste nicht mehr. Porsche arbeitet an einer Lösung – doch G. soll dafür bezahlen.

La plateforme de réseaux sociaux X, propriété d’Elon Musk, devra permettre à une organisation de la société civile basée en Allemagne d’accéder à ses données publiques, a décidé mardi 17 février la cour d’appel de Berlin.

The post Un tribunal berlinois contraint X à ouvrir ses données à des chercheurs sur les élections hongroises appeared first on Euractiv FR.

In den italienischen Alpen donnert unterhalb eine Lawine nieder. Diese löst eine massive Schneestaubwolke aus, die bis auf die andere Seite zu einem Skilift hinüberzieht, wo Skifahrer unterwegs sind. Diese sei jedoch ungefährlich, betont Meteo Valle d’Aosta.

Heftige Schneefälle sorgen in der Schweiz für Lawinenniedergänge. Einige Regionen sind noch von der Aussenwelt abgeschnitten. Mehrere Leser meldeten sich bei Blick – teils optimistisch und teils besorgt. Die eindrucksvollsten Bilder.

A múlt héten összesen 190 közlekedési balesetet regisztrált a rendőrség. 25-tel többet, mint a tavalyi év azonos időszakában. Négy súlyos sérült volt, egy ember meghalt – tájékoztatta a TASR-t Lea Vilhanová, az országos rendőr-főkapitányság szóvivője.

The media regulator cites the spread of false information and cyber-bullying as among the reasons.

Après plus d’une année sous surveillance renforcée, l’Algérie s’approche d’un tournant décisif dans son dossier avec le Groupe d’action financière. Réuni à Mexico du 11 […]

L’article Liste grise du GAFI : à l’ultime étape, que fait l’Algérie pour en sortir ? est apparu en premier sur .

In diesen Wochen findet der Prozess gegen Marius Borg Høiby statt. Ihm werden unter anderem Vergewaltigung, häusliche Gewalt und Drogenmissbrauch vorgeworfen. Blick hält dich über die Entwicklungen auf dem Laufenden.

Zwei Kinder wurden am Dienstag in der Fussgängerzone von St. Moritz von einem Auto erfasst. Der Wagen rutschte auf der winterlichen Strasse zurück. Die Geschwister aus der Ukraine wurden verletzt und ins Spital gebracht.

L’Union européenne a appelé le président de la FIFA, Gianni Infantino, à assurer la protection des supporters européens qui se rendront aux États-Unis pour la Coupe du monde cet été, a indiqué à Euractiv le commissaire européen chargé du sport.

The post L’UE demande à la FIFA de protéger les supporters lors de la Coupe du monde de foot aux États-Unis appeared first on Euractiv FR.

En raison des conditions météorologiques défavorables prévues sur le bassin méditerranéen, l’entreprise nationale de transport maritime des voyageurs (ENTMV) informe ses passagers que plusieurs traversées […]

L’article Traversées Oran, Skikda et Marseille : Algérie Ferries et Corsica Linea annoncent des reports est apparu en premier sur .

Priority reforms include improving childcare, recalibrating social transfers, and closing wage gaps. Credit: IMF

By Bunyada Laoprapassorn
WASHINGTON DC, Feb 18 2026 (IPS)

When Brazil’s unemployment rate dropped to 5.2 percent in November 2025—the lowest in a quarter century—it punctuated an impressive turnaround from the pandemic. Yet, while men’s participation in the labor market has returned to its pre-COVID trend, women have fallen behind significantly.

Getting more people into jobs is especially important because, in Brazil as in many other countries, an aging population is expected to weigh on growth. Our estimates suggest that halving the gap in labor force participation rates between men and women from 20 to 10 percentage points by 2033 could raise Brazil’s growth by 0.5 percentage point per year in the process.

Household responsibilities

The need to look after household and family responsibilities is a major reason why many Brazilian women find it hard to join the labor force—a trend that our analysis, which is based on Brazil’s Continuous Household Sample Survey, investigates further.

This is especially relevant given the ongoing debate about whether Brazil’s flagship conditional cash transfer program, Bolsa Família, is also discouraging women from entering the labor market.

Bolsa Família, which has targeted extreme poverty since 2003, currently provides an average monthly stipend of around US$130 for families that keep children in school and comply with mandatory vaccinations and other health requirements. It benefits around 50 million people—or about a quarter of the population—and was expanded significantly in 2023.

We look at the data to see if Bolsa Família is indeed curtailing women’s labor force participation. We find that, while Bolsa Família does not appear to systemically reduce labor force participation, the transfers are associated with a lower participation for women in households with children 6 years old or younger.

However, it is also important to emphasize that a full assessment of how Bolsa Família relates to economic wellbeing would need to encompass considerations well beyond just participation in the labor force.

Wage disparities

Another factor that could be working against female participation is the pay gap between men and women. We find that, on average, the monthly wage for women tends to be about 22 percent lower relative to men—after controlling for education, age, race, industry, and position. This pay disparity may encourage some women, including those receiving Bolsa Família benefits, to stay at home and care for their younger children instead of joining the labor market.

Policy options

As we explain in the report for our annual economic review (the 2025 Article IV Consultation), several measures can help more women join the labor market and support economic growth in Brazil. These include:

• Expanding access to affordable, accessible, and quality childcare and eldercare services, along with adjustments to the design of parental leave policy
• Adjusting the design of Bolsa Família—such as further tapering the exit from the Bolsa Família benefits upon employment to reduce any possible disincentives from paid work.
• Addressing pay disparities, including through effective implementation of the 2023 landmark Pay Equity Law.

Together, these measures can foster a more supportive environment for women to join the labor market and enhance Brazil’s economic potential.

Bunyada Laoprapassorn is an economist in the IMF’s Western Hemisphere Department.

IPS UN Bureau

 

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');  

TASR: Alkotmánybírósághoz fordult az Általános Egészségbiztosító (VšZP) a mentőállomások működtetésére kiírt 2019-es pályázat ügyében. A biztosító a Közbeszerzési Hivatal és a hivatal tanácsának eljárását és döntését támadta meg - közölte a TASR-rel Danka Capáková, a VšZP szóvivője.

Refusing to relent, Baloch women protest the abduction of their family members outside the Lasbela Press Club in Hub Chowki on January 24, 2026. Courtesy: Fozia Shashani

By Zofeen Ebrahim
KARACHI, Pakistan, Feb 18 2026 (IPS)

Fozia Shashani, 26, a member of the Baloch Yakjehti Committee, said it was “most painful” to hear reports that two Baloch women – Hawa Baloch, 20, and Asifa Mengal, 24 – had taken part in active combat as suicide bombers. The path, she said, was in complete contrast to her belief in peaceful resistance. Yet, she added, such extreme choices were the result of a state that had “failed its people.”

Her comments come in the aftermath of a series of coordinated gun and bomb attacks on January 31 across mineral-rich Balochistan—including Quetta, Mastung, Nushki, Dalbandin, Kharan, Panjgur, Tump, Gwadar, and Pasni – during which attackers stormed security installations, set government buildings ablaze, and looted banks.

The Baloch Liberation Army (BLA), a separatist group, claimed responsibility for the attacks, which killed 31 civilians – including five women – and 17 security personnel. The military’s media wing reported the killing of 145 militants in a 40-hour gun battle.

According to the Pakistan Security Report 2025 by the Pakistan Institute of Peace Studies, militant violence surged nationwide with 699 attacks — a 34 percent increase from 2024.

Road leading to the Karachi Press Club, where the Aurat Foundation was holding a press conference on December 4, 2025 against the abduction of Nasreen and Mahjabeen Baloch, was blocked by the police. Credit: Zofeen T. Ebrahim/IPS

This escalation was most pronounced in Balochistan, which recorded 254 attacks,  killing 419 people and injuring 607, up from 322 fatalities in 2024, in the province.

A video of Hawa, who joined the BLA’s Majeed Brigade (the suicide squad), shows her looking straight at the camera and laughingly saying, “Pakistan cannot face us,” “Today is a day of joy,” and “War is fun.” Taken before the attack, it signals a person who is defiant and fearless.

While previously rare, the recruitment of Baloch women by separatist groups is now more common, said security analyst Muhammad Amir Rana, director of PIPS. Already, a dozen women have died carrying out suicide bombings in the last four years.

He links it to the rise in enforced disappearances, a reality that he said “has pushed some women toward armed resistance.”

Despite thousands being disappeared or killed, more young people — women included — are drawn to the resistance.

Announcement poster circulated by the Aurat Foundation. Courtesy: Aurat Foundation

According to Amnesty International, enforced disappearances in Pakistan began in the 1980s but increased in the aftermath of 2001 followed by the US-led  ‘war on terror’.

Since 2011, the Pakistan Commission of Inquiry on Enforced Disappearances has recorded over 10,000 cases, of which 3,485 occurred in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and 2,752 in Balochistan. Figures from human rights organisations and the families of the disappeared suggest a much higher number.

However, not everyone has been pushed toward militancy due to personal tragedy.

Shari Baloch, 32, a mother of two and schoolteacher with no known history of repression, became the first Baloch woman to carry out a suicide attack in 2022 near the Confucius Institute at Karachi University, killing three Chinese nationals and their Pakistani driver. The BLA hailed her as a fidayee — a “martyr” of the Baloch nation.

The BLA claimed it would encourage other Baloch women to follow in Shari’s footsteps—a claim that has since proved true.

A chart produced by BYC gives a snapshot of enforced disappearances in 2025.

Although Baloch women may have been late entrants to armed struggle, women have long participated in conflicts worldwide —from Sri Lanka’s LTTE to El Salvador’s FMLN and India’s Naxalite-Maoist insurgency. However, Sanaullah Baloch, a politician from Balochistan, noted that it was Kurdish women fighting Daesh who inspired their Baloch counterparts to join men in the struggle.

This emerging visibility of women in militant roles, analysts say, reflects more than symbolic inspiration.

Iftikhar Firdous, founder and executive editor of The Khorasan Diary, said the role of female fighters in the recent attacks in Balochistan signals a “deeper strategic and ideological shift” which may require looking at resistance movements through a new and more gendered lens.

“Deploying women on the front lines signals the group’s attempt to personify the fight as all-inclusive considering the different age groups involved. It also creates an additional challenge, as traditional profiling no longer works and including women in security checks goes against norms of a tribal society,” he said.

It sends different messages to different stakeholders.

“For militant groups, women on the front lines send a strong message of sacrifice and resistance and for the security forces, they [women] pose a unique challenge during checkpoints, searches and intelligence operations, as until now they were considered less threatening,” he told IPS.

However, it is on the social and psychological front that militant organisations hope to make the most long-lasting impact to secure a steady supply of new recruits.

This step, said Sanaullah, a former senator, can be traced back through Baloch resistance history to 1948.

“Political awareness runs deep among the Baloch, including women; from an early age, it is shaped by a culture of discourse, poetry, music, and literature that reflects their historical grievances.”

To grasp the two-decade-old disillusionment, he said, “You must be a local to truly feel the humiliation and intimidation a Baloch faces daily on his own land – frequent roadblocks and security checkpoints where individuals are stopped, questioned, and asked to show identification, even verbally abused – by police and paramilitary forces. This causes an adverse psychological impact.”

Recalling his time as a young senator in 2009, he said he warned the state that if the Baloch continued to feel disenfranchised — shrouded in poverty and depression — the next generation would become a militant generation. “It was the perfect recipe, and this is exactly what has happened,” he said.

This view was echoed by Shashani.

“When you push a nation against the wall, when they live in constant fear, day in and day out, the psychological scars run deep,” she pointed out and added, “It used to be our fathers and brothers, but now mothers, sisters and daughters, sometimes minors, are being picked up without any documentation, and they return traumatised and violated.

“Although some were released, there was no official acknowledgement or a judicial process. Some were told they were picked up ‘by mistake’ without so much as an apology. It just feels we are a disposable nation, to be treated as they please.”

A fact-finding mission conducted between July 9 and 12, 2025, by the independent Human Rights Commission of Pakistan, stated in its report “Balochistan’s Crisis of Trust” that there has been a shift in the pattern of enforced disappearances from “prolonged incommunicado detention” to the “kill-and-dump” approach. Prominent politicians, including former chief minister and National Party leader Dr Abdul Malik Baloch and Balochistan National Party (BNP-M) chief Sardar Akhtar Mengal, told the HRCP that individuals picked up — often without warrants — were held for months before being extrajudicially executed.

After the national gathering in Gwadar, in 2024, a large number of individuals were picked up.

The Annual Report 2025 by BYC on the Human Rights Situation in Balochistan stated 1,223 enforced disappearances, with Sammi Deen Baloch, a senior central committee member, stating in her Foreword: “The BYC Human Rights Department undertook this documentation with care, verification and persistence, despite the risks involved.”

The report noted that while 348 people were released soon, 832 remain missing. Some 43 were killed either in fake encounters or their tortured and mutilated bodies were found dumped on roadsides. The report pointed to the law enforcement agencies as well as the “state-backed” death squads for these atrocities.

Shashani pointed to 18 cases of enforced disappearances of Baloch women between 2025 and January 2026, recounting their stories one by one. “Mahjabeen, who has polio, was abducted from Quetta, the capital of Balochistan, and has been missing since May,” she said.

She went on to put a face to each name: Rahima, from Dalbandin; Hazra, taken from Hub Chowki (on the border with Karachi but in Balochistan) — along with her son, despite her husband pleading with the kidnappers to take him instead; Hair Nisa, also from Hub Chowki; and Hani, a mother of two who was eight months pregnant with her third child, picked up in December and released a month later in January 2026.

Others included Nasreen, a minor from Hub Chowki, abducted in November; Farzana from Khuzdar, taken in October; and Fatima from Panjgur, whose husband had already been abducted three times and who herself was taken in January 2026 while caring for a small baby.

She paused, her voice trembling. “If you like, I can go on and tell you the tragic backstory of each of these women,” she said.

The BYC in its report Enforced Disappearances of Baloch Women in 2025 terms these abductions a tool of “collective punishment” against families – with raids, intimidation, and restrictions on movement generating fear and inflicting psychological harm.

Another phenomenon, said Shashani, is that after every militant attack, the dumping of dead Baloch increases. “The world is told militants were killed in the attacks, when we know, from the condition of the corpses, these people had not seen daylight for years.”

While the exact number of women recruited remains unknown, Rana had information and said many Baloch women had signed up, but limited space has meant that some were turned away.

Senior journalist Zahid Hussain described the trend as “public alienation” from the state, arguing that political negotiation — not force — is needed to restore public confidence.

But lasting peace cannot be achieved through dialogue alone, said Rana. It called for looking at the Balochistan conflict through a political economy lens — one that confronts uncomfortable questions about who benefits from the unrest, who controls resources such as land, minerals and jobs, and how state power is connected with economic interests — and answers them honestly.

He also urged the dismantling of the so-called death squads, explaining them to be a colonial-era legacy widely perceived to be linked to law enforcement. Describing the move as difficult, he emphasised it was “an important step in the right direction”.

Against this backdrop, Rana argued that the state must act before alienation deepens further. “It must engage with those who are protesting peacefully so they do not get recruited,” he said.

Yet scepticism persists. “They want the unrest to continue; they want people like us to eventually turn violent as well,” said Shashani.

But Senator Sanaullah said there was still time for change. “If the state shows leadership — by shedding conflict-driven language and honouring its promises — things can improve, even if the past cannot be undone.” For now, his 2023 proposal to set up a truth and reconciliation commission remains unheeded.

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');