Guinea Bissau

Several hundred students went on the rampage in the capital of Guinea-Bissau after police used baton charges, tear gas and shots in the air to break up a demonstration by secondary school pupils protesting at a strike by their teachers. Eyewitnesses said several dozen students were arrested in the disturbances that took place last Thursday. Bissau’s main avenue was closed to vehicle traffic and the city’s main market was shut down as a result of the clashes.

A student from Guinea-Bissau was stabbed to death in a southern Russian city in what appears to have been a racial attack, the African country's embassy said. Skinheads have been increasingly active in Russia recently, launching attacks on dark-skinned foreign students and migrant workers. Human rights groups have said the authorities weren't doing enough to combat hate crimes.

A strike by doctors, nurses and hospital technicians demanding the payment of salary arrears paralysed government hospitals in Guinea-Bissau for three days this week, forcing hundreds of patients to go home or seek treatment in private clinics if they could afford it. The strike was called by the two main trade unions in the health sector to protest at the government's failure to pay five months of salary arrears and special bonuses and to demand better food for patients.

Maria do Ceu Silva Monteiro, a 38-year-old woman judge, has been appointed president of the supreme court of Guinea-Bissau, filling a post that had been vacant for more than two years. She was elected on Monday on a six to one vote by other senior judges in this former Portuguese colony of 1.3 million people on the coast of West Africa.

A key decision-making body comprising representatives of Guinea-Bissau's main political parties and the armed forces has set March 28 as the date for legislative elections to return the country to constitutional rule following a coup in September. The National Transitional Council agreed the date last Thursday. Presidential elections are due to follow 12 months later.

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