The Carnegie Council on Ethics and International Affairs (CCEIA) is seeking short essays (1000-1200 words) for publication in the Fall/Winter 2001 issue of Human Rights Dialogue. The Fall/Winter 2001 issue will explore the nexus of human rights and peace work in conflict situations.

The Information and Communication Network (ComNet) has just published the third publication of its capacity building guide series, Dealing with Advocacy - A Practical Guide, written by Ms. Joke van Kampen. It contains detailed chapters on the necessity of NGOs to deal with advocacy, how to develop an advocacy strategy, the advantages of forming coalitions and how to incorporate advocacy into your everyday work.

What follows is a petition that will be forwarded to President Bush, and other world leaders, urging them to avoid war as a response to the terrorist attacks against the World Trade Center and the Pentagon this week. Please read it, sign below, and forward the link to as many people as possible, as quickly as possible. We must circulate this quickly if it is to have any effect at all, as the Congress of The United States has already passed a resolution supporting any military action President Bush deems appropriate.

The Young Entrepreneur Association of Zaragoza, Spain is organizing in collaboration with the European Union, The Spanish Kingdom, and the Government of Aragón the "I Virtual World Congress of Young Entrepreneurs and SMEs" that will be celebrated in October 2001. The objective is to create a community of business entities worldwide to participate in the development of the I World Congress of Entrepreneurs and SMEs.

SANGONeT is pleased to announce that it will start the development of an exciting new Internet portal on 1 October 2001, namely Thusanang: Southern Africa's Online Funding Resource Facility. The objective of this proposed facility is to develop and maintain a user-friendly "one-stop" Internet entry point to information on Southern African development funding issues. It will present funders and related institutions with a tool to disseminate and communicate information to NGOs on their funding activities in Southern Africa. At the same time, it will present Southern African NGOs with an up-to-date information and capacity-building resource to enhance their fundraising efforts.

VSO's website plays a critical role in recruiting 2,000 professional VSO volunteers, campaigning for policy changes and sharing development information with a worldwide audience. We need a web editor with the skills and vision to keep our website at the forefront of all our communications. Closing date: 12th October 2001. Interview date: 23rd October 2001.

In Ghana, the Ministry of Health, the School of Public Health and the Noguchi Memorial Institute for Medical Research (both institutions within the University of Ghana) will work with the other Gates partners to develop an innovative training programme to contribute to capacity building within the national malaria control Programme. Following a needs assessment, training materials will be developed and targeted at the most needy groups. The Training Manager would therefore be required to co-ordinate tasks aimed across the full spectrum of health worker and community needs. In addition he will need to be capable of forming strong links with in-country partners and other relevant organisations.

You will manage and develop IS's programme in West Africa. Based in York, your role will include liaising closely with Field Coordinators in Burkina Faso and Mali in the identification, management and evaluation of development worker assignments, and with partner organisations and donors in the field and in the UK.

This is a challenging post with great potential. Primarily responsible for working with local broadcasters to develop HIV radio programming in Sofala, Manica and Tete provinces.

A new website for HIV/AIDS in Africa. Compiles individual sites of all African countries, with links to key HIV/AIDS info. Also features a daily HIV/AIDS news page (updated daily), a discussion forum and other scientific articles.

The question dominating the news reporting of Tuesday’s attacks on the World Trade Centre and the Pentagon is “who”. Who did it? Who is responsible? Some strategists and security experts are trying to answer “how”? But the central question is not being asked anywhere. This question is: WHY?...There are many voices, by no means all radical and certainly not all terrorist, which recognise the contribution which US policy has made to increasing inequality and poverty around the world. Voices which question the universality of US American values and ways of life. If these (often moderate, democratic, liberal, American) voices are given credence, then forcibly eliminating an individual or a small group will not solve America’s problem. It is more likely that a show of extreme military and political power will confirm the grievance which tacitly or directly supports terrorist activity around the world...It is not a question of negotiating with or pandering to terrorists, nor a question of denying the rage and fear and suffering of those who have been directly and indirectly hurt by this attack. It is a question of recognising that large parts of the global population see the United States as a threat, and a question of recognising a measure of co-responsibility in creating this support. This is directly in the interest of preventing similar attacks in future.

Dear Friends, I am an American and I write to let you know that I agree with the sentiments expressed in the editorial "DOES TERRORISM REVEAL OUR OWN BARBARISM?" by Firoze Manji. I have always considered myself more a citizen of the world rather than of the USA and I have studied my government's many shameful actions in countries around the globe, including Africa. When I first saw the videos of the Trade Center bombings I immediately recognized the tragic symbolism and had a sad feeling that the war between the 'haves' and the 'have nots' had just begun. Of course none of us can condone terrorism, but it seems to me that we must investigate its causes. I myself have been pitted in a personal fight against a corporate conglomerate in the US which has erected a 480 foot cell phone tower close to my home deep in the quiet countryside where I live for the solitude and escape from city life. It is a tiny thing compared to what my international neighbors have had to suffer but I have had my own fantasies of blowing it up and it offers me an inside glimpse of the frustrations of the powerless and impoverished when faced with the accumulated might and wealth of a country such as the USA.

Non-Profit Resource Training will be presenting the following bumper short-course series in Cape Town from 17 to 20 October, to boost your non-profit organisation's fundraising efforts: * Effective Writing Skills for Fundraisers * Marketing Essentials for Successful Fundraising * Tax & the Non-Profit Sector: Encouraging Philanthropy Through Incentives * Fundraiser Remuneration & Working with FR Consultants * The A to Z of Volunteer Management. ENQUIRIES: Tel: +27 (21) 685 7726.

In spite of widespread proddings on him to appear before the Justice Chukwudifu Oputa Panel on Human Rights Violations, former Nigerian military President Gen. Ibrahim Babangida, again, fails to honour the summon.

Aimed at project leaders, programme managers and monitoring officials, this popular 4 day course aims to equip participants with skills needed to develop tools for a monitoring system. Topics covered include setting 'SMART' objectives, indicator development, planning a stakeholder analysis, identifying various data collection and analysis techniques and constructing an evaluation report. The course is run in a workshop style, whilst adopting a case study approach. For this reason participants should come to the workshop with a project in mind to work on throughout the course.

SANGONeT has vacancies for two positions at its Johannesburg offices:
Project Manager: Thusanang, South Africa’s Online Funding Resource Facility.
The successful candidate should have at least two years working experience in the field of managing information, previous experience in project work at a senior level and an interest in the southern African NGO sector and the funding challenges it faces.
Information Co-ordinator should have good writing skills, an ability and interest in working with information, from data capturing to news-writing and provision and an interest in the southern African NGO sector and the challenges it faces.
Contract Period: One-year, with the possibility of an extension
Remuneration will be competitive and is dependent on previous experience and skills. Please e-mail a CV, with references, of no longer than three pages.

All UN international staff were evacuated from Somalia on Monday 24 September, after insurance coverage for war-risk was withdrawn. The lapse of war-risk coverage was a result of the enormous insurance claims arising out of the attacks in the US on 11 September.

Rwanda is to set up 11,000 traditional courts, known as Gacaca, to ease pressure on an overburdened prison system now holding 115,000 inmates awaiting trial for the 1994 genocide, the state-owned Rwandan News Agency reported on Monday, quoting the advisor to the Supreme Court, Augustin Nkusi.

Life is returning to normal in the central Nigerian city of Jos after bloody clashes earlier this month between Muslims and Christians, but there are fears that the underlying tensions may have wider national and international ramifications.

The trial of four men accused of attempting to overthrow the Malawian government in March began on Tuesday with prosecutors alleging that the group had planned to take over the presidential palace and the radio station, AFP reported.

Recent findings by the United Nations Development Fund for Women, UNIFEM's independent experts' observation in war-torn countries show that traditional gender roles change in countries recovering from long periods of protracted wars.

The course is presented by Dr Albert Nolan and Theo Coggin, both highly experienced communicators in the religious and NGO fields in Southern Africa, and is intended for those responsible for compiling newsletters and reports, anyone who needs to improve their writing skills as well as those in executive positions charged with communication in their organisation.

The Electronic Community is a nonprofit organization that seeks to empower geographically diverse civil society organizations throughout Africa to actively participate in the process of African development by providing them with the technical tools, training and Internet presence they need to effectively achieve their development goals; while enhancing the internal capacities of the communities and environments within which each civil society organization operates.

Ahead of the UN Special Session on Children in New York later this month, UNICEF Executive Director Carol Bellamy spoke to IRIN on the establishment of a new agenda for children's rights, and her expectations for the 19-21 September conference.

The UN Mission in Ethiopia and Eritrea (UNMEE) has said it has established a board of inquiry to investigate and report on allegations of misconduct by members of the mission. The establishment of the board follows allegations appearing in Italian media that a former UNMEE peacekeeper was being investigated by the Italian military prosecutor's office over accusations of having allegedly had sex with underage girls while serving in the mission area.

A large-scale offensive was launched over the past days by the rebels of the UNITA (National Union for the Total Independence of Angola) in the central provinces of the nation. As referred by MISNA sources, though the number of victims is unknown, the toll is undoubtedly dramatic. There are also numerous reports of missing people.

Recently released documents have shown the role of the United States in blocking international action against the 1994 genocide in Rwanda. Africa Policy says that the documents reveal the "systematic indifference to African lives", as well as the fact that there has still been no official American investigation of responsibility for US actions and inactions at the time. These, it adds, "are a revealing commentary on the continuity of structural racism embedded in US foreign policy making".

The United States and Israel, faced with an implacable wall of support for Palestine, pulled out of the U.N. World Conference Against Racism Monday.

Civil society groups have been unable to forge a final declaration or programme of action to fight racism after five days of intensive talks alongside a similarly fractious meeting of their governments. The Aug. 28-Sep. 1 NGO (non-governmental organisation) Forum, held in tandem to the Aug. 31-Sep. 7 World Conference Against Racism, was marred by disorganisation and irreconcilable disputes over the wording of the declaration and action plan.

At a press conference in Durban, South Africa, today Amnesty International's Secretary General Irene Khan said the focus of the WCAR must be about human rights – the right of all persons to be treated equally without any racial or other bias or discrimination.

With one day remaining in the conference, the negative coverage of the World Conference Agianst Racism (WCAR) has reached a crescendo. We share the sense of missed opportunity that surrounds the conference, and yet whatever the last day brings, the notion of "failure" would be too simple and misleading. Indeed, if the goal of the conference is to raise consciousness about race and intolerance the signs of success abound. The greatest success has been the mobilization of victims of racism from communities around the world who have put their plight on the international agenda.

The west needs to apologise to its former colonies in Africa for the worst excesses and oppression of the imperial days.