#039;When Burmese President Thein Sein took office in March 2011, he said that over 60 years of armed conflict have put Burma’s
ethnic populations through “the hell of untold miseries.” Just three months later, the Burmese armed forces resumed military
operations against the Kachin Independence Army (KIA), leading to serious abuses and a humanitarian crisis affecting tens of
thousands of ethnic Kachin civilians.
“Untold Miseries”: Wartime Abuses and Forced Displacement in Kachin State is based on over 100 interviews in Burma’s Kachin

...Between June 2011 and February 2012, instability
across Kachin and northern Shan states resulted in
displacement, damage of infrastructure and loss of
lives and livelihoods. Despite ongoing peace negotiation
between parties to the conflict, incidents
continue to be reported. Additionally, there are
indications that a number of people fled just across
the Myanmar-China border and live with relatives
or in temporary makeshift camps, but information is
still unclear and cannot be independently verified.

Around the world, countries are becoming
urbanized at an astonishing pace. As countries develop
economically, their economies shift from mainly rural and
agrarian to increasingly urban and nonagricultural. This
rural-urban transformation presents both opportunities and
challenges for development. When managed effectively, the
transformation spurs growth and reduces poverty. When
managed poorly, however, the process can result in stark

This is a Regional Program Review (RPR)
of the World Bank's support for the MBC. The review is
framed around an assessment of five Global Environment
Facility (GEF)-financed World Bank implemented projects in
Costa Rica, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua and Panama that had
the common objective of consolidating the Mesoamerican
Biological Corridor (MBC). It also reports on the
achievements of trust fund activities, financed by the Bank

Climate change is widely acknowledged as
foremost among the formidable challenges facing the
international community in the 21st century. It poses
challenges to fundamental elements of our understanding of
appropriate goals for social and economic policy, such as
the connection of prosperity, growth, equity, and
sustainable development. This volume seeks to establish an
agenda for research and action built on an enhanced

Many experts believe that low-cost
mitigation opportunities in agriculture are abundant and
comparable in scale to those found in the energy sector.
They are mostly located in developing countries and have to
do with how land is used. By investing in projects under the
Clean Development Mechanism (CDM), countries can tap these
opportunities to meet their own Kyoto Protocol obligations.
The CDM has been successful in financing some types of

The study includes a conceptual overview
of the link between climate impacts and human rights,
focused on the relevant legal obligations underpinning the
international law frameworks governing both human rights and
climate change. As such it makes a significant contribution
to the global debate on climate change and human rights by
offering a comprehensive analysis of the international legal
dimensions of this intersection. The study helps advance an

Preparation of the $1.45 billion Nam
Theun 2 (NT2) project in the Lao People's Democratic
Republic (Lao PDR) represented an important milestone for
the government, the developers, international partners, and
other stakeholders. The story of its preparation and
implementation is an important one, because it provides
valuable insights and lessons that can be applied in future
projects of similar size, scope, and complexity. Projects

This is a Regional Program Review (RPR)
of the World Bank's support for the MBC. The review is
framed around an assessment of five Global Environment
Facility (GEF)-financed World Bank implemented projects in
Costa Rica, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua and Panama that had
the common objective of consolidating the Mesoamerican
Biological Corridor (MBC). It also reports on the
achievements of trust fund activities, financed by the Bank

Indigenous peoples across Latin America
and the Caribbean (LAC) already perceive and experience
negative effects of climate change and variability. Although
the overall economic impact of climate change on gross
domestic product (GDP) is significant, what is particularly
problematic is that it falls disproportionately on the poor
including indigenous peoples, who constitute about 6.5
percent of the population in the region and are among its

Poverty, environment, social
development, and gender are important cross-cutting themes
of the World Bank and government investment programs,
especially within the Sustainable Development Network (SDN).
For developing sectoral strategies and programs, economic,
environment and social assessments are undertaken, however,
these are usually done separately, and most often gender
issues are not included. This is a missed opportunity,

This paper explores the reduction of
food insecurity in Bolivia, adopting a supply side approach
that analyzes the role of agricultural spending on
vulnerability. Vulnerability to food insecurity is captured
by a municipal level composite -- developed locally within
the framework of World Food Program food security analysis
-- that combines welfare outcomes, weather conditions and
agricultural potential for all 327 municipalities in 2003,