Pambazuka News 425: Beware of human rights fundamentalism
Pambazuka News 425: Beware of human rights fundamentalism
The Western Cape Anti-Eviction Campaign decided at its provincial meeting to take up the case of the deceased one year old, Unabantu Mali, who died on her grandmothers back last week after being turned away from three clinics in Nyanga, Gugulethu and KTC. Unabantu's grandmother walked from Nyanga East to Gugulethu to KTC, barefoot, seeking help for Unabantu and being rejected at each clinic. She had no money to get to Red Cross hospital.
Smitu Kothari, noted Indian and international scholar, author and activist, who contributed to the network for over twenty years, passed away on 23 March. Deeply involved in ecological, cultural and human rights issues, Kothari strove to forge global alternatives to the world’s injustices.
The Democratic Republic of Congo government registered its ratification of the Protocol to the African Charter on Human and People's Rights on the Rights of Women in Africa on 9 February 2009, bringing the [pdf: 68kb].
Sokari Ekine reviews the following blogs:
Nigerian Curiosity
The Activist
Accidental Academic
BlackLooks
Following the South African brokerage of a power-sharing deal between Zimbabwe’s Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) and Zanu (PF) Patrick Bond explores whether, in the face of myriad threats to the country’s democracy, the wishes of the Zimbabwean people – as expressed in the People’s Charter adopted at a convention in February – could prevail. As South Africa and the African Development Bank join the Bretton Woods Institutions in calls for Tsvangirai to repay Mugabe’s odious debts, and South African firms hover in the wings to buy up the country’s assets for a song, what is at stake says Bond, is who will win the new economic chimurenga (liberation war) being waged in Zimbabwe. This article was presented at seminars in February, prior to the introduction of the Short-Term Emergency Recovery Programme and revised 2009 Budget.
Zambia is reckoned to be the 13th poorest country in the world. Sixty-four per cent of the people live in poverty. More than one in six children die before their fifth birthday, and if you live to the age of 42 you are doing better than average. Britain is the largest bilateral donor to Zambia, providing £40mn a year. But what Britain and the rest of the developed world provide may not be enough to stop an increase in children dying because of the global recession.
The Conflict, Security and Development Group (CSDG) at King’s College London together with the Africa Leadership Centre (ALC), in collaboration with the Commission of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), is pleased to announce a call for applications for the MA Studentships and Mentoring Programme 2009-2010.
Oxford Transitional Justice Research (OTJR) aims to bring disparate views on and approaches to transitional justice into a single arena. In pursuit of this, we are proud to host, at the University of Oxford, an international conference, “Taking Stock of Transitional Justice,” which is designed to assemble vast knowledge on transitional justice from across geographical locations and areas of academic study and practice. Exploring established views and new thinking on transitional justice, OTJR would like to invite all interested parties to submit a presentation abstract or register for general participation.
The IFJ has called on the Senegalese Government to dialogue with media companies following the threat to close private radios and televisions stations for nonpayment of licenses fees. “This is a serious threat on jobs for journalists and on press freedom. Indeed, it is surprising that this decision was made on a Sunday, the day of election, when the provisional results were not favorable to the government” declared Mr. Gabriel Baglo, Director of IFJ Africa Office.
The Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) and its near global ratification have been seen as true accomplishments in this sense. Yet, despite this recognition and success, the range and severity of problems faced by children at the start of the twenty-first century are persisting, if not increasing. The year 2009 marks the 20 th anniversary of the Convention. The occasion provides a timely opportunity to assess the value of the CRC in engaging with dilemmas on the ground, in devising multi-faceted approaches other than a purely legal or technical response, and in evolving to meet new challenges that emerge from its practical implementation.
Kwantlen Polytechnic University invites you to participate in the Kwame Nkrumah International Conference: August 19-21, 2010 at its beautiful Richmond campus in British Columbia, Canada. The Conference will commemorate the centenary of the birthday of Dr. Kwame Nkrumah, Africa’s Man of the Millennium, and bring scholars and students from Canada and from the around the world to share research and ideas on Africa’s place in the global community, and to discuss the life, achievements and shortcomings of Africa’s foremost Pan-Africanist.
At this session, this Council has heard about the tragic killing of three persons.
Edwin Legarda was shot to death on 16 December 2008 by members of the Colombian armed forces shortly after his wife, Aida Quilcué, had been active at the third session of the UPR Working Group in connection with its review of Colombia.
On 5 March 2009, Oscar Kingara and Paul Oulu were murdered - soon after meeting the Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions during his mission to Kenya in February 2009.
Members directly engaged schools in Bulawayo on issues of education as part of an ongoing campaign to demand affordable education for all children. Community-based demonstrations were held at five schools in Bulawayo whilst representative groups met with school heads at another five schools to outline the concerns of parents. These activities will be duplicated across Bulawayo at other schools in coming days.
It is often said: “If you do not take care of politics, it will take care of you anyway”. Politics is in the public sphere because it is supposed to take care of defining, guiding and deciding the course of everyone’s life. Whereas women contribute to society, their input is not recognized. They cannot be in charge of their own destiny because gender is artificially relegated to the private domain. Assuring domestic labor, raising children and feeding everyone is done by women all over the world, but this essential contribution is taken for granted.
March 24, 2009 is Impunity Day in Kenya - the Human Rights Defenders Day. It was the 24th day of March in 1996, when Daniel arap Moi’s State assassinated our dear Karimi Nduthu. Karimi Nduthu had just finalized an investigative report into the state sponsored ethnic clashes of 1992 and 1993 which targeted targeting ethnic populations of the Gikuyu, Kisii, Luo and Luyha in Rift Valley, Nyanza, Western and Coast Provinces.
Tanzanian researchers will investigate whether mobile phone technology can be used to encourage safer sex among homosexual men. The project aims to give homosexual men information about HIV/AIDS via their mobile phone's short message service (SMS) in the dominant language, Kiswahili.
While shelters are bursting at the seams with children in need of care, bureaucracy, by children’s institutions, is hindering many homosexual parents from giving love to those who need it most. The present economic climate has, according to child adoption agencies, also seen a drop in the number of applicants wanting to adopt, as people are uncertain about the future.
Society's expectations and presentation of women make them more vulnerable to catching sexually transmitted infections (STI’s) and HIV, participants at Southern Africa HIV and AIDS Information Dissemination Service (SAFAids) workshop heard last week. One of the facilitators, Lillian Chikara from SAFAids said there was need for women and girls to be empowered for them to make informed decisions when negotiating safe sex.
In South Africa, if you are poor your right to justice through the legal system is often denied. If you don't have money for lawyers its hard to get justice. Therefore, the law is for the rich because they have ample money to buy 'justice'. Landlords who have money can afford to try and evict people continuously by accessing the courts and paying the best lawyers to throw people out of their houses. In South Africa, communities don't have money to continuously go to court to fight for, what should be, their basic rights. In the legal system, you are discriminated against if you are poor.
Last week, a Sudanese refugee girl was sexually harassed in the street, while waiting for a taxi in the Al Haram district. A taxi driver pulled up and verbally and physically harassed her. When she accused him of verbally and physically harassing her, he drove his car towards and hit her with the car repeatedly. She attempted to desperately defend herself, but did not have time to do so. The taxi driver then grabbed her arm and hand and began moving the taxi.
We have received news from the African Union Legal Counsel’s office that the Democratic Republic of Congo deposited its instrument of ratification with the AU on 9th February 2009 although according to the status update attached DRC ratified the same on 9th June 2008 making the number of countries that have ratified the Protocol 27.
On April 27, 2009 the Ogoni people of Nigeria will finally have their chance at justice when the families of famed activist Ken Saro-Wiwa and his colleagues, who were sentenced to death in a sham trial in Nigeria and hanged in 1995, will show that Royal Dutch Shell was at the very least complicit in their deaths and likely colluded with the Nigerian military to quell peaceful protests through murder, torture and destruction of villages. The plaintiffs’ attorneys will use a U.S. law on the books since 1789 called the Alien Tort Statute (ATS) that allows violations of international law to be tried in U.S. courts.
The International Finance Corporation (IFC) has partnered with the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA) in Nairobi to unlock credit and financing for small-scale farmers and agribusinesses across sub-Saharan Africa. The organisation will expand AGRA's existing innovative financing projects to reach more countries and key stakeholders in the African agricultural value chain.
Alliance for Green Revolution for Africa's Vice President for Policy and Partnerships, called on African governments to commit to investing in agriculture. Speaking at a meeting hosted by UN Commission on Sustainable Development in Windhoek , Namibia , Dr Akinwumi Adesina, Dr Adesina warned, ‘the next food crisis must not catch the continent by surprise.’
Beninese President Boni Yayi met with Chinese Assistant Foreign Minister Zhai Jun here Wednesday. Yayi said Benin and China have a deep-rooted friendship and the Beninese government and people thank China for its long-term aid. He said the Beninese government will continue to adhere to the one-China policy. Benin hopes to establish and develop a comprehensive partnership of cooperation with China, enlarge collaboration in the fields of infrastructure and social development, and enhance bilateral relations, Yayi said.
Chinese officials plan to open a malaria research center in the Cameroonian capital of Yaounde, Shen Yi, a Chinese embassy official, said recently ahead of an opening ceremony for the center, Xinhuanet reports. The center is expected to cost three million Chinese yuan, or about $440,000, Xinhuanet reports. China also plans to send four malaria experts to Cameroon for 50 days, Shen said. Shen added that China sends a team of malaria experts to Cameroon annually but that the team plans to work with a Cameroonian team this year to share China's experience in controlling the disease.
A Mozambican and South African consortium, Petroline Holdings, plans to start building a $620-million oil pipeline linking Johannesburg to the port of Maputo before the end of this year. Mateus Kathupa, CEO of state-run Mozambican company PETROMOC, which holds a 40% stake in the consortium, said on Thursday the construction of the petrol and diesel pipeline would take six months.
Four Chinese nationals have been caught red-handed while over-harvesting limpets worth N$21 680 in Walvis Bay around the Mola Mola and NamPort areas. According to the Ministry of Fisheries and Marine Resources, Control Fisheries, Michael Koopman, the Chinese nationals tried to run away, but the fisheries inspectors eventually caught up with them and brought them in for questioning.
China’s so-called investments in Namibia bring very little, if any, skill and technology transfers, neither do such investments play a significant role in developing the country’s value addition and manufacturing base. This is according to a new report on Chinese Investments in Namibia. The report lays bare the murky Chinese investments and more importantly Government’s ineptitude to set strategic priorities on which to negotiate foreign direct investment
Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao Tuesday urged tougher prevention and punishment on corruption, saying "China faced the toughest year in its economic development since the turn of the century." Localities and departments should step up supervision over corruption, regulate the use of executive power, tackle persistent problems that harm public interest and accelerate construction of a system to prevent and punish corruption to provide a solid guarantee for reform, development and stability, Wen told a conference on clean governance.
Chinese and Guinean workers toil shoulder to shoulder on a sun-blasted construction site at this crumbling city's edge, building the latest symbol of an old and sturdy alliance: a $50 million, 50,000-seat stadium. This city is littered with such tokens of a friendship that first flowered when Guinea was an isolated and struggling socialist state in the late 1950s.
Democratic Republic of Congo will push ahead with a $9 billion Chinese mining and infrastructure package despite pressure from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) which believes the deal will add to Congo's debt mountain, a top government official said on Monday. Under the 2007 agreement, Congo will receive much-needed roads, railways, hospitals and schools while China secures billions of dollars worth of lucrative copper and cobalt reserves it needs to feed its export-driven economy.
In creating a $30 million trust fund to boost the food output of developing countries, China has cemented its role as a major global player in cooperation between developing countries, the United Nations agricultural agency said today. “This historic agreement underlines the importance of the role which China has come to play in the global arena today,” José Maria Sumpsi Assistant Director-General of the UN Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) said after signing an agreement with the Chinese Vice-Minister for Agriculture.
When President Barack Obama comes to London next week, he will find one great power missing at the world's summit table: Europe. Five of the 20 leaders at the G20 meeting will be Europeans, representing France, Germany, Britain, Italy and the EU, but the whole will be less than the sum of its parts. There will be plenty of Europeans but no Europe.
China's top legislator Wu Bangguo on Monday pledged to work with Seychelles to push forward relations between the two countries and their parliaments. Wu, chairman of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress (NPC), China's top legislature, made the remarks when meeting with Seychelles National Assembly Speaker Patrick Herminie.
More opportunities for Chinese investment into Africa are to open up soon, with the announcement that China is to bolster its China-Africa Development Fund by an additional US$2-billion. The state-run equity fund has already invested in 20 projects, totalling a massive $400-million, in Africa since it was established in June 2007.
Chinese Assistant Foreign Minister Zhai Jun arrived in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DR Congo) for a two-day visit during which he unveiled humanitarian aid to refugees in the central African country. Zhai and his Congolese counterpart Ignace Gata Mavita held talks before signing economic and trade agreements between the two countries, including 4 million RMB (about 600,000 U.S. dollars) in humanitarian aid to the refugees in the eastern part of the country.
President Isaias Afwerki has received and held talks at the Denden Hall with a delegation from the People's Republic of China (PRC) headed by Mr. Lu Quingcheng, Vice President of the China-Africa Development Fund. Briefing the delegation on the available wide-ranging investment opportunities in Eritrea in various sectors, the President pointed out that the Government has been giving top priority to the task of laying conducive ground for investment, and that encouraging accomplishments have been registered as regards putting in place the necessary infrastructure.
A delegation of the China Council for Promotion of International Trade (CCPIT) arrived in Abidjan, the capital of Cote d'Ivoire, on Saturday for a three-day visit to follow up a blueprint set in 2006 between China and West African countries. The Chinese delegation headed by CCPIT Vice-Chairman Zhang Wei has been on a mission since March 14 to boost cooperation with the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), according to a communiqué released by the regional bloc.
Copper stockpiling by a secretive Chinese state organisation has helped trigger an impressive rally of almost 35 per cent in the price of the metal this year. Copper’s fortunes are closely tied to the industrial cycle so the price jump, bigger than that of gold, has grabbed attention outside the commodities market, with some questioning whether it could signal a turning point for economic growth.
The west's leading economic thinktank expects "very negative" growth this year, its head has warned. However, Angel Gurría, secretary-general of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development, said in Beijing that China's gross domestic product would expand by 6-7% – below last November's forecast of 8%. The World Bank cut its growth forecast for China to 6.5% this week.
China’s central bank on Monday proposed replacing the US dollar as the international reserve currency with a new global system controlled by the International Monetary Fund. In an essay posted on the People’s Bank of China’s website, Zhou Xiaochuan, the central bank’s governor, said the goal would be to create a reserve currency “that is disconnected from individual nations and is able to remain stable in the long run, thus removing the inherent deficiencies caused by using credit-based national currencies”.
Chinese government is to make available a grant of seven million dollars for the construction of a 100-bed capacity general hospital in Ghana. The ultra modern hospital, to be sited at Teshie would also have an anti malaria centre and is scheduled to be completed in about two years. Mr Yu Wenzhe Ambassador of China made this known when he paid a courtesy call on the Health Minister Dr. George Sipa Yankey.
At the time when financial storm hit the entire world economy, China came to emerge in the global spotlight viewed as the Salvager to rescue the deepening downward spiral from meltdown, as it boasts bulky foreign exchange reserves and the steadily growing economy, decelerating right now, though.
China will import 1.8 million barrels of African crude in April for the government's strategic reserve, said a trade source familiar with the transaction, as it capitalises on low prices to add to already swollen state stockpiles. The purchase, news of which comes after an industry official said in early March that China's emergency tanks are already filled to the brim, may suggest that stock levels have begun to ease after two months of low crude imports.
The SACP fully appreciates and accepts the decision by the South African government not to grant a visa for the Dali Lama visit at this time. We stand by our government on this matter. It is a well known fact that the month of March is a particularly sensitive period as it is associated with the Dalai Lama's putsch for cession of Tibet from China.
In 2003, the Muslim Marriages Bill (Bill) was submitted by the South African Law Reform Commission (SALRC) to the Minister of Justice and Constitutional Development (Minister of Justice). Since then, to our knowledge, the Minister of Justice has not done anything to move forward with the Bill in the parliamentary process (even though the SALRC undertook four years of extensive consultations from 1999 to 2003 within the Muslim communities and broader civil society when it drafted the Bill and obtained a general consensus within the Muslim communities for the Bill).
For its Investigative Journalism Helpdesk in Johannesburg, South Africa, the (pan-African) Forum for African Investigative Reporters (FAIR), seeks a Peer mentor/editor to assist investigative journalism projects carried out by African investigative journalists, either individually or as FAIR grantees and FAIR team projects.
The 18th African Human Rights Moot Court Competition will be held at the University of Lagos, Nigeria from 10 to 15 August 2009. Students, academics and judges from all over Africa are invited to participate. All law faculties in Africa are invited to send one faculty representative who works in the field of human rights (dean or another lecturer) who will serve as a judge in the preliminary rounds, and two undergraduate students (preferably one man and one woman) who will constitute the team that represents its university at the Moot Court.
The number of chronically hungry people has surpassed the 1bn mark for the first time as the economic crisis compounds the impact of high food prices, the United Nations’ top agriculture official has warned.In an interview with the Financial Times, Jacques Diouf, director-general of the Food and Agriculture Organisation, warned that the increasing numbers of undernourished people could trigger political instability in developing countries.
Girl Child Network (GCN) turns 10 years on 21 March 2009, and in this regard, girls, GCN staff, stakeholders and friends in Zimbabwe are all looking back and reflecting on this noble path travelled. All of us are busy preparing for the official commemoration of GCN’s 10th Anniversary scheduled for 28 March 2009. A summarised informative document regarding GCN’s work and the commemoration will be issued soon by GCN’s Communications and Development Office, which will also include the program of the day.
On April 10th, family members of the Cuban Five imprisoned in the United States have an appointment in the U.S. Interests Section in Havana , Cuba , to request their visas. This will be the tenth time that Adriana Perez, wife of Gerardo Hernandez, will request a visa to see her husband in a prison in the U.S. where he is serving an unjust sentence. During a decade, the United States government has denied this couple the possibility of seeing each other.
The SA blog awards is a showcase of the very best of South African blogs. The 2009 SA Blog Awards is scheduled for its annual process of nominations and voting this year from 1st March through to 1st April, and the winners announced on 3rd April. Among those in contention is
Thousands of people from across the UK will march through central London tomorrow (Saturday 28 March) ahead of the G20 summit to demand decent jobs and public services for all, an end to global poverty and inequality, and a green economy. At a rally in Hyde Park, they will hear calls for a co-ordinated fiscal stimulus to create and preserve jobs, international action to ensure that an out of control finance sector never threatens the stability of the global economy again and a commitment from world leaders that they will move to a low carbon economy.
Mali has projected a budget of CFA F 239 billion (US$475 million) for the 2009-2010 'agricultural campaign' aimed at raising the production of rice, maize and wheat, government sources told PANA here Wednesday.
Nigeria and China have signed a contract for a new communications satellite that will replace one sidelined by a power failure, a newspaper reported Wednesday. According to the contract signed in Beijing on Tuesday, the replacement satellite has been named NIGCOMSAT-1R and is due to be launched by 2011 with no cost to Nigeria, the Lagos-based Guardian reported. The new space vehicle will replace NIGCOMSAT-1, which was launched on May 14, 2007, but was displaced on Nov. 10, 2008, because of a solar power failure that occurred on one edge of the satellite.
Rwanda and DRC have set in motion high-level negotiations over the return of warlord Gen Laurent Nkunda after a deal on Monday in which the government ceded too much ground to the Gen Nkunda’s former fighters. Rwanda Foreign Affairs Minister, Rosemary Museminali, was set to meet with her DRC counterpart Alexis Tambwe Mwamba on Thursday, with teams representing security, diplomacy and justice to discuss bilateral cooperation on a number of fronts, including Gen Nkunda’s fate.
Zimbabwe's new inclusive government should carry out comprehensive justice reforms without delay to ensure accountability for past abuses, the US-based Human Rights Watch (HRW) said on Thursday. The New York-based organisation noted that as the first year anniversary for Zimbabwe’s controversial elections approached on March 29, the country’s neighbours should take the opportunity to press the unity government to demonstrate its commitment to human rights reforms before releasing development aid.
Giles Mutsekwa, Zimbabwe’s co-Home Affairs Minister, says a truth and reconciliation commission should be put in place as a way of promoting national healing in a country smarting from unprecedented politically-motivated violence. Mutsekwa told cheering supporters at a rally in Dangamvura township in Mutare those responsible for brutalising Zimbabweans should voluntarily come forward and apologize to the nation.
Zimbabwean professionals, many of them teachers, are coming home and seeking readmission into the public service, in response to a move by the country’s new inclusive government to pay civil servants in foreign currency and relax conditions for rejoining the sector. The influx is a response to calls from President Robert Mugabe and Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai for the more than three million exiles, who sought refuge from their country’s chaotic economic situation in Southern African Development Community, SADC, countries and abroad, to return to Zimbabwe to help rebuild the country.
Zimbabwe's Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai has said that anyone invading farms will be arrested - in an apparent challenge to Robert Mugabe. Mr Tsvangirai said the recent land invasions "are actually acts of theft". President Mugabe has said that the government would continue to seize white-owned farms as part of his land reform policy.
Guinea-Bissau cannot afford to hold elections following the assassination of its president earlier this month, Cape Verde's prime minister says. Cape Verde is helping co-ordinate efforts to restore order in its fellow former Portuguese colony. According to the constitution, polls should be held within 60 days.
Most people in Ethiopia's lower Omo River Valley continue to exist much as they have done for hundreds of years with virtually no concession to the 21st Century, with one disturbing exception: automatic weapons. Almost every male carries a Kalashnikov or an M-16 assault rifle, and what might in the past have been a fairly innocuous dispute over grazing or water-rights between different groups, now frequently escalates into bloody warfare.
Somali Interior Minister Abdulkadir Ali Omar has been wounded in a deadly bomb attack in the capital Mogadishu. The BBC's Mohammed Olad Hassan in the city says the minister's secretary was killed and a bodyguard also injured. The minister was passing through the capital's bustling Bakara market - a stronghold of the radical al-Shabab militia - when a landmine went off.
Supporters of Madagascar's former President Marc Ravalomanana are staging daily street protests - just one indication that Africa's youngest president has a tough road ahead of him.
The Kenyan government should urgently renew efforts to revise and enact bills to create a special tribunal to try those responsible for last year's election violence, Human Rights Watch said today. The organization also issued a memo explaining the procedures of the International Criminal Court in relation to the special tribunal.
How can elections be turned into a development asset in Africa? This study by the Institute of Security Studies argues that in order for elections to become a real asset, African countries need to implement effective decentralisation, including the empowerment of local communities within a rationalised national plan. If they can do this they will also prevent conflicts and achieve increased national self-confidence and self-empowerment in relation to the global politico-economic and strategic environment.
Governments made their pledges over the Millennium Development Goals agreed in 2000, but it is civil society that could, more than anyone else, hold them to that promise. Salil Shetty, a civil society man coming as the head of ActionAid to head the UN millennium campaign, believes civil society has moved in from the margins; it is now at the heart of the world campaign for delivering these, and other rights.
Hundreds of thousands of Somali refugees will face a humanitarian emergency this year, unless urgent steps are taken to deal with a serious public health crisis unfolding in the Dadaab refugee camp in northern Kenya, international agency Oxfam has warned in a new report.
Major floods in late 2008 and 2009 have plunged southern Africa into a growing humanitarian crisis, killing dozens and displacing thousands. The Zambezi River Basin is affected annually by floods, bringing death and disease to those living along the banks. The fourth largest river in Africa, has its source in Zambia and flows through Angola, back into Zambia, and along the borders of Namibia, Botswana and Zimbabwe to Mozambique, where it empties into the Indian Ocean.
A prominent Gambian opposition figure arrested on 8 March and later charged with sedition and spying, was unconditionally released on Friday. Halifa Sallah is believed to have been arrested for articles he wrote for the main opposition newspaper Foroyya, which claimed that witch doctors accompanied by members of the army, police and the National Intelligence Agency (NIA) including “the green boys” - Gambian President Yahya Jammeh's personal protection guards - were identifying people as witches.
More than 180,000 ex-fighters in Sudan’s decades-long north-south civil war will be assisted to return to civilian life as their ongoing demobilization enters a new phase, the United Nations mission in the country (UNMIS) has announced. The mission said in a press release that reintegration is the last and most crucial phase of the multi-million dollar scheme for the process known as disarmament, demobilization and reintegration (DDR) called for by the Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA), which in 2005 ended the 22-year conflict.
More than 100 CAR refugees crossed the volatile border to south-eastern Chad over the weekend, joining over 6,800 others who began arriving earlier this year in two sites near the remote Daha village registered by the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). Another 2,500 new arrivals are sheltering just across the border in the Chadian village of Massambaye, 125 kilometres east of Daha.
U.S President Barrack Obama has reversed a decision by his predecessor George Bush to ban the supply of contraceptives to seven African based family planning organizations. The ban had initially disrupted the supply of family planning materials by Marie Stopes International to Zambia, Ghana, Malawi, Sierra Leone, Tanzania, Uganda and Zimbabwe.
South African ruling party leader Jacob Zuma on Friday criticised Western powers for holding back aid to Zimbabwe while President Robert Mugabe was still in power."This is very unfair to the Zimbabwean people. Because here is Mugabe, he is a factor. He is there. He leads a party that has been in government for over 20 years," Zuma told Reuters in an interview.
One of Africa’s largest countries, DRC, has taken the first towards creating a fibre link to its neighbours and the outside world. A little-noticed announcement was made at the end of last month by the Vice-First Minister for Reconstruction that gave the green light to start construction work on a fibre optic link from the capital Kinshasa to the coastal town of Muanda. Russell Southwood looks at the potential impact on the country’s connectivity.
Around one-quarter of deaths in people with HIV worldwide were caused by TB in 2007, the World Health Organization said today. Around 450,000 people with HIV died of TB in 2007, WHO estimates, and there were 1.4 million HIV-positive TB cases. HIV-positive people are around 20 times more likely to develop TB than HIV-negative people in countries with a high HIV prevalence.
Moroccan authorities want to strictly confront all practices and suppress all brochures, books and publications that seek to undermine the country's religious and ethical values. A statement issued by the Ministry of Interior on March 21st revealed the full scope of the government's agenda: to "preserve citizens' ethics and defend our society against all irresponsible actions that mar our identity and culture".
Girls living in Moroccan towns are five times more likely to remain in school as their rural peers. The national attendance rate is around 60%, but is only 16.5% for girls in isolated areas. Given that the distance between rural girls' homes and schools is the primary reason for the disparity, an innovative residential programme may be the solution to keeping girls in school for more than just six years of primary education, organisers recently told a Rabat forum.
Mauritania's political crisis worsened this week, following a statement by French Minister of Foreign Affairs Bernard Kouchner. In a March 20th interview with Jeune Afrique, Kouchner stated that General Mohamed Ould Abdel Aziz, Chairman of the High Council of State, "has to take off his military uniform at least 45 days before the presidential election that is slated for June 6th, 2009".