Ei-iE

The humanitarian crisis as a result of the conflict in Georgia is growing despite the declaration of a ceasefire and the commitment to the withdrawal of Russian troops.

EI launched an urgent action appeal on 14 August in a bid to save Farzad Kamangar, a 33-year old teacher and former trade unionist from the Kurdistan Province of Iran, who is currently at risk of being executed following the ruling issued at an unfair trial.

Education International welcomes the announcement that the military conflict in Georgia has ended, and calls for steps to be taken immediately to assist the families of those civilians who have been killed in the conflict and the many persons who have been displaced by the destruction of their homes. EI...

Education International (EI) has sent a message of solidarity to its affiliates in Algeria regarding the 35 teachers on hunger strike since 15 July 2008.

Three teachers who joined a committee in support of Farzad Kamangar have been imprisoned, and several other trade unionists who have been calling for re-examination of his case are now receiving threats and phone calls from the Ministry of Intelligence, which does not hesitate to call family members of activists...

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which celebrates its 60th anniversary this year, states that “everyone has the right to education.”

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In a recent study entitled “Education Quality and Economic Growth”, the World Bank explores the strong link between educational quality and economic growth. However, the study’s definition of educational quality and some of the measures proposed for improving educational quality may be controversial.

Brazilian educators are celebrating a new law that establishes a national standard salary, bringing to an end decades of inequity between teachers’ salaries in different regions of the country.

"If we want education to be the main vector to achieve equal rights and combat discrimination, teachers themselves must first be set free," said EI General Secretary Fred van Leeuwen. He was speaking in Stockholm on 1 August at a seminar on "gay rights in education" organized by the Swedish...

After nine grueling days of negotiations, trade ministers meeting in Geneva July 21-30 admitted defeat in their attempts to reach a new global trade deal, but promised to regroup at a later date.

The latest issue of the Africa Regional Bulletin is now available for download.

EI has written to Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi to deplore that the Charities and Societies Proclamation, a draft law, is a covert means of placing civil society organisations under government control. EI joined Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International in their criticism of the proposed legislation.

The recent controversy in South Africa on making condoms available in schools highlighted what remains a sensitive issue in some societies. The fear that sex education combined with access to contraception, including condoms, encourages young people to have sex at an early age is a very real concern for many...

Recent workshops in Venezuela and the Dominican Republic reflect the growing emphasis on intra-regional partnership. In this spirit of cooperation, Gabriela Bonilla of the EI Latin American Regional Office in Costa Rica and Rosario Avila from the Honduran teacher union movement travelled to facilitate workshops in Caracas and Santo Domingo.

The Namibia National Teachers’ Union, NANTU, has produced a comprehensive HIV and AIDS Workplace Policy. The document, which was drafted in consultation with the legal assistance centre in Namibia, was launched on 21 June during the National Teachers’ Council Meeting. NANTU plans to attune their EFAIDS activities to the policy...

Mor Mbengue, Deputy Secretary General of the Senegalese Union Démocratique des Enseignantes et des Enseignants du Sénégal (UDEN) travelled to Bamako, Mali to share his knowledge of the new EFAIDS toolkits with Malian colleagues. Forty national facilitators of the Malian Syndicat National de l’Education et de la Culture (SNEC) from...

The Global Union AIDS Programme is organising a two-day Labour AIDS Forum to facilitate trade union cooperation in advance of the biennial International AIDS Conference taking place in Mexico City from 3-8 August 2008.