There is a new publication of Women's NGO Networks in Nigeria: "Providing Reproductive Health Information and Services; Promoting Reproductive Rights". This profile documents the significant contributions of women's NGO networks in Nigeria that provide reproductive health information and services and/or promote reproductive rights.

Workbook: Public participation in Local Government. A Framework for Action, comes at the right time to transform the theory of public participation into practice at grass roots level. The Workbook presents a reader friendly training guide and toolkit for the application of public participation on the local government level in South Africa.

Yesterday I gave a lengthy interview to NBC News on legal efforts to stop lethal injection on the grounds that it constitutes torture, cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment in violation of customary international law and treaties to which the United States government is a party. During the course of this interview, I informed NBC News that Amnesty International just recently rejected my good faith proposal that AI undertake and produce a comprehensive study of botched executions by means of lethal injection, which would constitute the critical factual basis for this legal argument. I will continue to inform every news media source that interviews me of Amnesty's negative decision on this LI study despite its professed commitment to eliminating the death penalty in the United States.
Francis A. Boyle
Professor of International Law
Board of Directors, Amnesty International USA (1988-92)

Although online access to the Internet has recently been introduced in many African universities, librarians in those universities often feel inadequately trained in its use. This is a programme of 'travelling' workshops on Internet use for staff in nine university library systems in Africa.

Description of an approach to community participation that has worked for thousands of trainers in dozens of countries.

GPU The Gambia Press Union (GPU) has petitioned the inspector-general of police over the recent brutalisation of an Observer reporter, Allieu Badara Mansaray, by the Bundung police.

Since 1979, International Year of the Child, the protection of children involved in war and adverse situations has become an international priority for rights activists and policymakers. How can children living in different cultures and countries best be helped?

What are policy processes? Why do they matter? Why are environmental policies based upon highly questionable assumptions so persistent? How and why are particular types of knowledge established as policy? Can policy processes be opened up to more diverse forms of knowledge?

Why don't African markets operate as economics textbooks tell us they should? How do long-term trading relationships and business networks get established in the absence of enforceable legal redress against fly-by-night tricksters?

The best interests of the child are served when the mother and the father are involved in their upbringing. Changing family roles, however, are influencing the socialisation of children. Why then, is consideration of the roles that men play often absent from development programmes targeting children?

The International Development Goals set targets for the reduction of poverty, improvements in health and education, and protection of the environment. This new web site presents the latest data on country and regional progress towards the goals using easy-to-understand maps and graphs.

The website, a project of Journalists Against AIDS (JAAIDS) Nigeria, is designed to be the one-stop online resource centre to access up-to-date information on HIV/AIDS in Nigeria and all 16 countries of West Africa. On the website, visitors will find the latest statistics on HIV/AIDS in West African countries; over 200 HIV-related abstracts, research reports and presentations on HIV in the Nigerian/West African contexts; the entire versions of the recently-launched HIV/AIDS Emergency Action Plan for Nigeria; publications, reports and studies on media and HIV/AIDS in Africa.

A former minister of finance, five customs officials and four businessmen have been charged with corruption in one of the biggest cases of its kind in the country, judicial officials said on Thursday.

United States pharmaceutical giant Pfizer announced on Wednesday that it would provide unlimited supplies of the drug Diflucan free of charge to treat HIV/AIDS sufferers in 50 of the world's poorest countries. "This is a lifetime of work not just a one-day press release," Dr Henry McKinnell, Chairman and CEO of Pfizer, said at UN headquarters. "We will continue to work with the UN, the WHO and other international organisations on how public/private partnerships like the Diflucan programme can be most effective."

In March 2001, EHP provided input to USAID/Mozambique in the development of an expanded program of technical assistance for Mozambique's National Malaria Control Program (NMCP). EHP's input builds on lessons learned over the past two years, during which EHP helped national and local authorities improve malaria surveillance in Maputo and develop detailed maps of the distribution of malaria cases and risk ("stratification") in the capital city. For information on the activity, please contact: Gene Brantly.

Liberia's president, Charles Taylor, his wife, son and two ex-wives head a list of 130 people banned by the United Nations Security Council from travelling abroad. The travel embargo is part of a sanctions package that went into force last month to punish Liberia for fomenting war by allegedly supplying guns to rebels in Sierra Leone in exchange for diamonds. It includes an arms ban as well as an embargo on diamonds exported from Liberia, where Taylor is alleged to head the illegal operations. He and his government have denied this.

In a scathing attack on men, Speaker of the National Assembly Dr Frene Ginwala blamed the "old boys network" for destroying governments' integrity "Links established in schools and universities, in villages and on golf links all too easily slip from an old boys network into nepotism, whether based on the old school tie or ethnicity, and jobs for the boys, deals for the boys and tenders, kickbacks and commissions," she said.

COSATU condemns the attempt by the so-called war veterans to render unions ineffective. This is basically an attack on the trade union movement and human rights. The ZANU PF and the war veterans approach which shows the extent of their desperations to make themselves relevant after dismally failing the poor and the working class, now has taken an extremely shorted sighted and self destructive approach in trying to win back the working class back to the ZANU PF. Factory invasion and extortion can only lead to more and more potential investors staying away and those with factories packing their bags and heed to somewhere else where there is stability.

A Call To Action: Media indifference leads to "skepticism, fatalism and paralysis," warns MediaChannel adviser Albina du Boisrouvray; AIDS (Un)Awareness: Media monitoring studies show how the press have politicized and distorted the issue in South Africa; The Media And The Epidemic: MediaChannel presents global
perspectives on media's role in this Special Report from November.

Government is set to hike tuition fees for students studying at state universities by over 2 500% from August this year, a move that is set to trigger a wave of dropouts and violent protests. Documents in The Standard's possession show that vice-chancellors from state universities recently recommended that students pay up to $70 000 a year, up from the current $1 450 and $1 650 a year, depending on the degree programme.

Two hundred schools in deprived hamlets of Upper Egypt are sending ripples through the country’s education system, making girls and women the beacons of a new learning experience.

This discussion on slashdot links to 2 articles about the new 'smart tags' in Windows XP. Read about the implications of this software for information integrity. One fear is that smart tags will mean links from your web site are no longer controlled by you, but by Microsoft.

Mike Jensen's report on current Internet connectivity in Africa lays out the facts. He also provides commentary on the difficulty of measuring this with accuracy. The report is not confined to current connectivity, but looks at policy and future plans to increase and improve Internet access throughout Africa.

Composer/Producer Paul Anderson has been running 2 internet music stations dedicated to getting people focused on the crisis of Slavery in Africa.
Paul hopes to hear from organizations that are making legitimate efforts to end this situation, and to prevent it from being so low on America's foreign policy agenda. "People have to be shown that Slavery is not a thing of the past! In the hearts,and minds of all that will listen, I hope our efforts will make have an impact!"

How times change. Less than two years ago, some of the most powerful decision-makers in the world emerged from a Washington office block to declare "very good news for the poor of the world." The Heavily Indebted Poor Countries (HIPC) initiative to reduce the debts of the world's poorest countries, derided as woefully inadequate after its launch in 1996, had just been "enhanced".

SVTG has received confirmation that Mustafa Abdel Gadir was arrested today, Tuesday 5 June at 2:30pm. Mr Gadir, 61, is the principal defence lawyer for the NDA members currently awaiting trial.The NDA men were first arrested on 6 December 2000, following a meeting with an American Diplomat in Khartoum. Security forces alleged that the NDA members were part of a conspiracy planning to incite a popular uprising, disrupt national security and support the rebel movement with American logistical support. An appeal was lodged which was rejected and the men were rearrested on Thursday 10 May and Friday 11 May, 2001.

The World Association of Newspapers is recruiting publishers world-wide for a new study on advertising effectiveness that will provide both customised results for local markets and a global presentation aimed at advertisers who are increasingly running regional or global campaigns. The Paris-based WAN announced the new project on Tuesday during the World Newspaper Congress in Hong Kong, where it unveiled the results of world-wide research showing that newspapers are an effective advertising medium, particularly when used in combination with other media.

Twenty people were killed and 17 wounded when their vehicle hit an anti-tank mine in northern Angola, news reports said Friday. Two others died later in the hospital at Malange, about 190 miles east of the capital, Luanda, the Portuguese news agency Lusa said. The blast took place Thursday on a rural road about 25 miles north of Malange, according to Lusa.

The SETI@home (Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence) project has made distributed computing famous. Now there are two new projects which are aimed at medical research - and your computer can help.

Despite the crash of the new economy and the death of countless internet companies, "technology will not be denied," say the editors of "Innovations in Newspapers 2001," the annual world report on developments in the
newspaper industry. The report, prepared by Innovation Media Consulting Group for the World Association of Newspapers, focuses on the light-speed changes taking place in the industry and how advanced technology is changing the daily newspaper into a new entity.

Most cities in developing countries face the prospect of increased malnutrition and health risks if they do not improve people's access to adequate and safe food, the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) said in a statement published today. "Feeding cities means that more food needs to be produced, moved to cities and distributed within the expanding urban areas. This in turn means more lorries, greater market congestion, higher piles of garbage, greater risks of food contamination and greater soil, water and air pollution. Many cities are rapidly losing urban and periurban land suitable for food production, have insufficient and inefficient transport, markets and slaughterhouses", said Olivio Argenti from FAO.

In February 2000, a Senegalese court indicted Chad's exiled former dictator, Hissène Habré, on torture charges and placed him under house arrest. It was the first time that an African had been charged with atrocities by the court of another African country. In March 2001, however, Senegal's Court of Final Appeals ruled that he could not be tried in Senegal for crimes allegedly committed in Chad. The victims are now seeking Habré's extradition to stand trial in Belgium and have also filed a complaint against Senegal with the United Nations Committee against Torture. In the meantime, the case has opened new possibilities for justice in Chad itself.

The Bush administration's new energy policy proposes no strategy to keep energy investment from perpetuating dictatorships or fueling conflicts, as has happened from Angola to Sudan to Central Asia, Human Rights Watch charged today.

Published quarterly in print & electronic format. Covers information technology for development topics & is mainly addressed to the development community.

Job Title: Coordinator Of Small Grants Programme; Location: Dakar (Senegal); Closing Date for Applications: 30th June 2001; Contact Details: UAPS President UAPS/UEPA Stele Mermoz Route de Pyrotechnie x Avenue Cheikh Anta Diop BP 21007 Dakar/Ponty Dakar SENEGAL Tel. (221) 825 59 51/824 35 28 Fax (221) 825 59 55 mailto:[email protected] mailto:[email protected]

This section of the Benton Foundation's web site is called 'funder's corner' and features interesting articles on the latest trends and resources in fundraising and grantmaking.

This web site is a gateway to many resources for human rights activists around the world. It provides an opportunity to access discission forums, campaigns and resources as well as to submit new resources. There are also links to other NGOs. The site is searchable.

After eight weeks of debates and 12 hours of deliberation, the jury of the Brussels 'Cour d'Assises' [Crown Court] in Belgium declared four Rwandans guilty or partially guilty of war crimes committed during the 1994 genocide. The announcement came at 0230 (local time) on Friday morning. The sentences will be pronounced on Friday afternoon. The four - Vincent Ntezimana, 39, a former professor at Butare university; Alphonse Higaniro, 52, the former director of a match factory; and two nuns Consolata Mukangango, 42, and Julienne Mukabutera, 36, known as sisters Gertrude and Maria Kisito - face a maximum sentence of life imprisonment.

With Central African Republic (CAR) government forces of President Ange-Felix Patasse back in "full control of the situation" in the capital, as confirmed by the French embassy in Bangui on Thursday, an increasing stream of residents who fled a failed coup attempt were returning to the city.

As forces loyal to Central African Republic (CAR) President Ange-Felix Patasse surrounded remaining mutineers one week after a failed coup attempt in the capital Bangui, relief organisations issued urgent warnings of a looming humanitarian crisis.

If nothing can be written about Kenya today without the name of its President Daniel Arap Moi weaving its way into the narrative, it is a testament to the legacy his twenty three years in power has bequeathed Kenya. For in those twenty-three years, President Moi has reduced a once proud country into an economic dunghill foraged by his cronies and a political Babel in which the only common language is himself. Even more frightening is his transformation of a peaceful multi-ethnic society into a snakepit where communities are manipulated to believe that their survival depends on the annihilation of others.

Kenya has not yet gone the way of Somalia, Rwanda or Burundi. It still has a largely functioning political infrastructure for controlling ethnic conflict. It might even sound alarmist to suggest the possibility of conflict. That might well be so and violence might not be. But that is largely dependent on the decisions of the regime of President Moi in the next few months.

Kenya is set to go to elections in 2002 with President Moi constitutionally barred from running. Since 1992, when Kenya held its first multiparty elections, politically motivated ethnic violence has become the byword for elections. With Moi set to leave the scene and the ruling cabal scared of the possibility of life without power, the entire future of Kenya might be up for the toss.

In 1992 and 1997 Moi used actual violence and the threat of violence to retain power. The orgy of violence left close to 2000 Kenyans dead and thousands displaced. No one was punished and the real truth remains buried in the official rhetoric of building peace.

Since then, the map of violence and impunity has continued to grow. Close to 40% of the country is now under one form of violence or another. The northern region bordering Ethiopia, Somalia and Sudan has become bandit territory. With the government focused on containing the activities of opposition politicians and other political challengers, insecurity in these regions has reached the levels of law intensity warfare, pitting rival militias of local political kingpins of the ruling party. With the political instability in Ethiopia, Sudan and Somalia, easy accessibility of arms has transformed the conflict from a political shouting match to a deadly affair.

With the Kenyan economy growing at below zero, the economic collapse has heightened the sense of despair. The uncertainty of whether President Moi will abide by the constitution and retire from politics or will seek to cling on has not helped the situation. With Moi playing a wait-and-see game over his exit investments have continued to board up for the possible eventuality.

In the meantime, many of Moi's close allies, variously implicated in planning violence and wanton corruption are proposing a constitutional manipulation that allows Moi to continue playing a role in Kenyan politics. With Moi back in power, either as president or Prime Minister in a new constitutional arrangement, they will be able to escape accountability for human rights violations. Prosecution of the corrupt and those behind political violence in Kenya, it has been argued, will only lead to further instability and violence. Some supporters and critics of the Moi government have argued that it is time to close the chapter and move on. Time to turn the page, so to speak.

In all this, however, the cries of justice continue unanswered. Closing the chapter may be easy to speak of for those who were not been personally touched by the violence and corruption of the government. But for those who lost relative and property and the millions who have been economically disappeared there can never be a closure. A new chapter will mean addressing their loss and misery.

Kenya is now at the threshold of writing a new constitution. Closing the chapter of corruption and political violence means that the new constitution will not remember this part of Kenya's past. For those who died under police fire while fighting for a new constitution, a closure without justice is an erasure of their memory and their existence. While a new constitution is a fresh beginning, it is not a forgetting of the past.

The negotiation of the future in Kenya still revolves around Moi. He still controls the machinery of political violence. He has used this machinery to play hostage-politics in the past. Indications are he is ready to use it again to allow himself to escape the reach of accountability. Allowing Moi and his allies to escape accountability for instigating ethnic violence may buy the silence of his extremist supporters. But will it be justice?

On Britain's second National Holocaust Memorial Day, the Institute of Contemporary History and Wiener Library, London is organising a conference focusing on four genocides of the twentieth century. Highlighting Armenia, the Balkans, Rwanda and the Holocaust, the conference will examine the history, processes, implications and responses during and after the conflicts.

The European Union (EU) on Friday called for the Government of Sudan and the rebel Sudan People's Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A) to immediately stop hostilities in order to create a conducive atmosphere for negotiations to end the 18-year civil war. It also encouraged Kenya, in its capacity as chair of the Inter-Governmental Authority for Development (IGAD) committee for Sudan, to press ahead with its fellow IGAD members to reinvigorate the peace process, which has not made much progress so far.

A new report on UN peacekeeping issued on Thursday recommends improved consultations between the Security Council and troop-contributing countries among the ways to strengthen field operations, UN Mission in Sierra Leone said. The report, the first by the Security Council Working Group on Peacekeeping Operations, also supports establishing regional peacekeeping training centres to increase international cooperation for operations. In addition, the group suggests troop-contributing countries cooperate in training, logistics and equipment.

Health authorities in Guinea-Bissau seized on Wednesday 140 kg of expired medicine from several pharmacies and street vendors in the capital, Bissau, as part of an effort to combat the sales of illegal medicine, the Panafrican News Agency (PANA) reported on Thursday.

Two field workers from Refugees International in Washington DC have started a month-long mission to Cote d'Ivoire, Guinea, Liberia, and Sierra Leone to assess the needs of internally displaced Liberians and those who have sought refuge in the neighbouring countries, the NGO told IRIN on Friday.

South African President Thabo Mbeki has told Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe to respect the rule of law and publicly assure Zimbabweans and the international community that his government will conduct a free and fair presidential election next year, 'The Financial Gazette' said on Thursday.

Zambia's largest hospital began shutting down wards on Thursday, as a strike by thousands of civil servants continued to cripple government services. About 90 percent of Zambia's 90,000 civil servants embarked on the strike on 28 May, demanding that their salaries be doubled and their working conditions be improved. The government has offered 35 percent increases, the Associated Press reported.

Zimbabwe's opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai has described as "positive" the South African government's apparent shift towards a policy of engagement with his Movement for Democratic Change (MDC). The MDC in the past had been kept at arm's length by a South African government pursuing a policy of "quiet diplomacy" with President Robert Mugabe.