By Kalinga Seneviratne

DHAKA, May 14 (IPS) - The right to information (RTI), as espoused by the United Nations and international human rights organisations, does not have full endorsement from South Asian media practitioners and scholars.

By Marwaan Macan-Markar

BANGKOK, May 13 (IPS) - Images of the dead keep trickling out of Burma. The most moving are those of children who died when Cyclone Nargis tore through their world in the populous Irrawaddy delta.

By Catherine Makino

TOKYO, May 12 (IPS) - The final seconds in the life of a Japanese death row inmate -- the rasping muffled last words, the trapdoor springing open, the whip of a noose and a Buddhist gong signalling the end -- has made radio history here, waking listeners up to what goes on in one of the most secretive execution systems in the world.

By Nalaka Gunawardene

As the United Nations and aid agencies struggle with the incredibly uncaring Burmese bureaucracy to get much needed emergency relief for the affected Burmese people, the media outside Burma are having great difficulty accessing authentic information and images.

By Zofeen Ebrahim

KARACHI, May 5 (IPS) - "My captivity only brought honour upon me," is how journalist Suhail Qalandar sees his ordeal at the hands of kidnappers last year. He was talking with IPS over the phone from Peshawar, capital of the North West Frontier Province.

By Shailendra Singh

SUVA, May 5 (IPS) - Fiji’s interim government has come under withering criticism both nationally and internationally for the deportation on Friday of the Australian publisher of the leading ‘Fiji Times’ daily, Evan Hannah.

By Lynette Lee Corporal

BANGKOK, May 2 (IPS) - More than gaining the freedom to report on society’s problems Asian media must gauge it’s real contribution to the public‘s needs, especially at a time of increasing commercialisation.

By Lynette Lee Corporal

BANGKOK, May 2 (AMF) - The good news is that media, whether mainstream or community-based, can be effective tools in helping to make the Millennium Development Goals (MDG) a reality by 2015. The bad news? It's not happening.