The UK government-funded Open Data Institute will focus on incubating and nurturing businesses wanting to harness open data, training and promoting standards, according to co-director Professor Nigel Shadbolt, who is heading the £10 million project with Tim Berners-Lee.

Syria, Libya, Egypt and Yemen have moved up the international Peoples Under Threat ranking that lists countries where communities are most at risk of mass killing.

The courage shown by protesters in the past 12 months has been matched by a failure of leadership that makes the UN Security Council seem tired, out of step and increasingly unfit for purpose, says Amnesty International's 50th global human rights report.

A new psychological intervention has been shown to more than halve the trauma experienced by child victims of war, rape and sexual abuse.

Yemen is on the brink of a catastrophic food crisis, with 10 million people – 44 per cent of the population – without enough food to eat, say NGOs.

American society has lost its claim on democracy, says Henry A. Giroux.

Governments are challenged to invest in resilience, strengthen local control over natural resources, and apply realistic values to the environment and human well-being in order to steer societies onto a more secure path.

Fifty years after Rachel Carson’s warning call, have we learned anything?