Pambazuka News 241: International Criminal Court: A Ray of Hope for the Women of Darfur?
Pambazuka News 241: International Criminal Court: A Ray of Hope for the Women of Darfur?
This fact sheet looks at the relationship between access to sexual and reproductive health services and five of the eight Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). The authors argue that poor reproductive health is hindering countries' efforts to achieve the MDGs and that access to reproductive health services influences global security by helping to hasten the demographic transition.
Lawyers who advocate on free expression and media freedom issues anywhere in the world are encouraged to apply for the 5th Media Law Advocates Training Programme, an intensive three-week seminar which aims to build skills and knowledge in litigation and advocacy. Taking place from 9-28 July 2006, the programme is hosted by the Programme in Comparative Media Law and Policy at Oxford University, in collaboration with the Open Society Justice Initiative and other organisations. Email: [email protected].
This project is designed to support the growth of an organisation that uses communication and advocacy approaches to act as a liaison between international agricultural research organisations, such as the Global Forum for Agricultural Research, and African national and sub-regional organisations. FARA, that is, plays a role as a catalyst in bringing together the various stakeholders (research institutions, research systems, non-governmental organisations, donors, farmers, and private firms) and encouraging them to negotiate and cooperate on agricultural research issues of mutual interest.
Building on the first two White Papers this new White Paper on International Development will set out what the UK government will do - in developing countries, in the UK and internationally to translate the promises of 2005 into better lives for poor people in poor countries. The new White Paper will focus on three central themes: what can we do to reduce poverty and deliver development more quickly; what policies are needed in the UK and internationally to create the conditions necessary for reducing poverty; how can the international development system be reformed so that it delivers better results for development, and be more responsive to the needs of poor people.
The mace, the symbol of the Kenyan Parliament's authority, has been flown to London to be polished at a cost of about Ksh. 2 million (about $28,500), a local daily in Kenya has learnt. And the Criminal Investigations Department is now investigating the manner in which the mace left Parliament. An official who did not want to be named, said polishing the mace in London would cost the National Assembly Ksh. 2 million yet the same work could be done by a local goldsmith for about Ksh. 20,000 (about $285). The Parliamentary Service Commission, which authorises expenditure of more than Ksh. 1million was not aware of the development.
Wireless networking holds huge potential for developing nations to overcome their communication infrastructure challenges. But, without access to good information, building reliable wireless networks in often hostile conditions and without resources can be all but impossible. Now a new, free manual focused on assisting developing-nation wireless practitioners hopes to overcome some of these challenges and limitations.
Expressing “serious concern” at the volatile situation in Côte d’Ivoire, where United Nations offices were looted and destroyed last month, the Security Council today (February 6) authorised extra troops to boost the strength of the UN peacekeeping mission in the West African nation. Reacting to Secretary-General Kofi Annan’s calls last week for more military personnel, the Council unanimously agreed to a temporary redeployment of troops from the UN mission in Liberia (UNMIL), but the numbers fell short of Mr. Annan’s request for an infantry battalion and a police unit.
South Africa is to press ahead with the compulsory purchase of land from white farmers, a senior official has said. The move is intended to speed up the restoration of ancestral property to those who lost it under apartheid. The government previously bought land at market rates for redistribution, but has been criticised for being too slow in its efforts to redistribute land. Compulsory purchase will now come into effect in cases where the government and the seller cannot agree on a price.
Tanzania is to receive more than $11 million from the US for a multifaceted anti-corruption programme. The grant is part of a US aid initiative intended to reward and encourage economic, social and governance reforms in developing countries. The two-year, $11.1 million package is being awarded to Tanzania in response to the country's own proposals for fighting corruption.
Uganda's ministry of Health will in the first quarter of this year launch Coartem, a new drug for the treatment of malaria. The ministry realised that the efficacy of the current drugs in use was below the standards set by the World Health Organisation (WHO). The government has obtained financial assistance of $64 million for the next two years from the Global Fund for HIV/Aids, Malaria and Tuberculosis to purchase the drug following failure in the current treatment regimes.
Some 26 logging firms in East Africa say they stand to lose more than $ 4.6 million as well as their markets in Europe, Asia and America, following the Tanzania government's decision to ban exports of logs and sandalwood. It is estimated that the country loses between 130,000 hectares and 500,000 hectares of forest a year. Of that, 91,000 hectares are illegally felled. Human activities, population growth and poverty also reduce forest coverage by hundreds of thousands of hectares every year.
A South African policy that was in effect from 1999 to 2005 that used race as a donor-selection factor for donated blood significantly reduced levels of HIV-tainted blood in the national supply, according to a study published Feb. 1 in the Journal of the American Medical Association, the AP/Washington Post reports.
In Uganda a palliative care service has been successfully implemented in three districts with outreach to other parts of the country. The key to its success is that service is centered on the patient and focused on the quality of care rather than quantity. Hospice Africa Uganda's (HAU) palliative care service started in Kampala in 1993 with funds for a team of three over three months. The Government also allowed the importation of low cost powdered oral morphine.
Uganda must make greater strides toward stemming the spread of HIV/AIDS in the country, AIDS Commission Director General David Kihumuro Apuuli said Monday when releasing Uganda's 2005 HIV/AIDS status survey, Uganda's New Vision reports. Apuuli, speaking at the fourth Annual Partnership Forum outside the capital city of Kampala, said the report shows that transmission rates are shifting from the youth to Ugandan adults ages 30 to 40, with current prevalence rates in that age group at 6.4%.
At least 12 people, two of them children, have died from an outbreak of acute watery diarrhoea in the southern Sudanese town of Yei, the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) has said. The outbreak, UNICEF said in a statement on Monday, was first reported on 4 February when three deaths occurred and 48 patients were admitted to local health facilities.
Chad's fight against AIDS is set to be one of the main victims if a standoff between the government and the World Bank drags on, senior UN officials have warned. The World Bank recently suspended all its loans to the impoverished landlocked country because of a decision by President Idriss Deby to tamper with an agreement governing how revenues from its fledgling oil project can be spent.
The critical shortage of health care workers and weak health systems is the key bottleneck to scaling up access to AIDS treatment. While the needs of individual countries must be determined locally, experts estimate that sub-Saharan Africa needs at least 1 million new health workers to meet essential health needs. Sustained commitment and creative action are necessary to develop and support the health workforce needed to secure the right to health and achieve universal access to AIDS treatment by 2010, as well as other international health goals.
The first batch of 10,000 Sudanese refugees who have lived in the Central African Republic (CAR) for 16 years arrived home this week following a recent agreement between the two governments and the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). To ensure their successful reintegration into society on their return, NGOs are operating health programmes to treat endemic illnesses such guinea worm, leprosy and river blindness - all concerns among these communities as they return home. UNHCR, IOM and other organizations have implemented programmes that would provide assistance with water, health, education, food security and income generation.
At least 2,000 villagers in two provinces in the northwest of the Central African Republic are hiding in the bush without food while an equal number has fled to neighbouring Chad recently to avoid fighting between the army and bandits, local sources said. At the same time, humanitarian workers said on Friday displaced villagers in the provinces of Ouham and Ouham Pende were in dire need of relief aid as insecurity had prevented humanitarian agencies from providing help.
The Cairo Institute for Human Rights Studies (CIHRS) is organising a training workshop, entitled "Media and Building Diversity and Democratic Culture in Sudan." The training will be held in Khartoum in the period from 5th to 11th of February 2006. It is organized in cooperation with the Sudanese Radio and Television Association and supported by the European Commission, with the participation of approximately 35 journalists working in the Sudanese Radio and television. A group of media and Human Rights experts from Sudan, Egypt and Canada will participate in the workshop.
Software developed by a company founded by South African billionaire Mark Shuttleworth has been installed by Google, the world's most-used search engine. Despite such a prominent endorsement, Shuttleworth will not be making any money: the software is free to use. Since selling his internet company to Verisign for US$575m in 2000, Shuttleworth has become a champion of open source, the free-to-use, free-to-alter software that challenges costly brand-name products.
The CODESRIA Democratic Governance Institute is an interdisciplinary forum which brings together African scholars working on topics related to the broad theme of governance. The aim of the Institute is to promote research and debates on issues connected to the conduct of public affairs and the management of the general development process in Africa. The Institute was launched in 1992 and has been held every year since then in broad collaboration with the Cheikh Anta DiopUniversity, Dakar, Senegal.
The Council for the Development of Social Science Research in Africa (CODESRIA) was established in 1973 as an initiative of African scholars for the promotion of multidisciplinary research that extends the frontiers of knowledge production in and about Africa, and also responds to the challenges of African development. Within the broad framework of the mandate defined for the Council in its Charter, various research and training programmes have been developed over the years for the purpose both of mobilising the African research community and responding to its needs. The Council also has a robust publications programme which has earned it a reputation as one of the leading scholarly publishers in Africa.
The mission of the Funders Network on Trade and Globalization is to support foundations and other members of the funding community in their efforts to promote global relations, policies and institutions that foster environmentally sustainable, human-centered and just economic development in the US and around the world. FNTG is for grantmakers who care about human rights, democracy, peace, social justice, and environmental sustainability.
Written and produced in collaboration with partners, Cutting Edge Packs from Bridge provide accessible overviews of the latest thinking on a gender theme and summaries of the most useful resources. Each pack includes an Overview Report, a Supporting Resources Collection and a copy of Gender and Development In Brief.
Independent Newspapers has offered to publish an apology for any offence a weekend article might have caused to Muslims, already in an uproar about a Danish-penned cartoon lampooning the Prophet Muhammad, according to a report on news24.com and as reported on www.journalism.co.za Chris Whitfield, editor of the Cape Times and a member of an Independent Group newspaper delegation, said: "(The) decision to apologise by Cape Argus was an acknowledgement of an error in judgement." The delegation met the Muslim Judicial Council on Tuesday.
Johncom’s new website — www.reporter.co.za — highlights the potential and limitations of the new craze for citizen journalism, begins this column posted on www.journalism.co.za and written by journalism professor Anton Harber. "Think of the potential problems. How do you verify stories e-mailed into you? How do you prevent commercial interests from placing their public relations material? Or planting stories for fun or to harm their competition?"
Jean-Louis Ngalamulume, editor-in-chief of the Kinshasa-based newspaper "L'Eclaireur", has been imprisoned at the capital city's Penitentiary and Reeducation Centre (Centre pénitentiaire et de rééducation de Kinshasa, CPRK) since 31 January 2006. The journalist stands accused of "public injury" towards Denis Kisalambote, a land holder in Mount Amba (located on the east side of the city). The journalist was stopped on 27 January at approximately 2:00 p.m. (local time) by M. Kinuani, an officer of the judicial police force, who then drove him to the Kin-Mazière police station. In a verbal hearing, Ngalamulume was questioned regarding an article that appeared in the 11 January edition of his newspaper (issue 56), within which M. Kisalambote was described as being "incompetent" and "tribalist".
Sierra Leone's attorney general has confirmed that he will not pursue charges of manslaughter against a member of parliament and two others accused of assaulting journalist Harry Yansaneh in May 2005. At the time, Yansaneh was acting editor of the private newspaper For Di People. A judicial inquest found that the attack contributed to Yansaneh's death from kidney failure more than two months later.
Exploration and development of oil resources in Sudan has all along been controversial. International human rights organisations have accused the Sudanese government of financing human rights abuses with oil revenues, including the mass displacement of civilians near the oil fields. Oil exploration in Sudan began in the late 1950s and was originally concentrated on the Red Sea continental shelf.
Haitians put aside fears of violence and voted by candlelight into the night on Tuesday (February 7) in the first presidential election since Jean-Bertrand Aristide was toppled two years ago. Three people died, including a policeman lynched by a mob, and voting began more than three hours late in many areas, infuriating poor supporters of former President Rene Preval, a one-time Aristide ally favored to win. But with U.N. peacekeepers keeping watch, polling stations stayed open several hours after the official 4 p.m. (2100 GMT) closing time so everyone still in line could vote.
Oxfam recognises the next few years as a defining moment for the African Union as a positive force for realising the social, economic, political and cultural rights of Africans. Over the last few years, we have successfully supported the emergence of strong coalitions and effective advocacy that has held the African Union accountable to this vision (see www.oxfam.org.uk/what_we_do/ issues/panafrica). This position shall expand these relationships and make a real impact on poverty and suffering by influencing African policy makers to promote and protect the rights of poor communities across the continent. This would be your challenge should you join us as the Pan Africa Senior Policy Analyst. Follow the link for more information, as well as a French version of the job posting.
This paper illustrates the challenges involved in providing good-quality gender-equitable education for children of nomadic and pastoralist households who are beyond the reach of mainstream, formal education. Some of the key issues highlighted in the paper include the limited, and failed, provision of static schooling, or projects which have focused on getting nomadic boys and girls to adapt to the formal system.
In Amnesty International's biggest campaign ever, high-profile international artists sing covers of classic Lennon tracks to raise funds for the organisation. This is Make Some Noise - a mix of music, celebration and action in support of human rights. Tracks can be bought and downloaded from the site, where supporters can also sign-up for updates to keep in touch throughout the 12-month timeline.
Akina Mama wa Afrika (AMwA) is relocating its Head Office to Kampala, Uganda. AMwA is seeking an Executive Director, who will oversee the relocation from UK to Uganda, and lead the organisation through the next phase of its development from the head office in Uganda. The UK office will continue to carry out programmes in UK/Europe as a regional office.
Does foreign aid help develop public institutions and state capacity in developing countries? In this Working Paper, the authors suggest that despite recent calls for increased aid to poor countries by the international community, there may be an aid-institutions paradox. While donor intentions may be sincere, the authors conclude that it is possible that aid could undermine long-term institutional development, particularly in sub-Saharan Africa. By reviewing the evidence of the potentially negative effects of aid dependence on state institutions, the authors provide a thorough analysis of the institutional effects of aid.
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The CGIAR Gender & Diversity Program (G&D) is pleased to invite applications from qualified women scientists in East Africa for a two-year fellowship. With generous support from The Rockefeller Foundation, these fellowships are open to women scientists from national agricultural research institutes (NARIs) and universities in Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania working in crop sciences. The overall goal is to increase women's skills, visibility and contributions to science and development.
“In most countries, university communities can be viewed as social barometers: academics and students can respond more freely and idealistically to external events than can people in the outside world whose lives are more constrained. Thus, during the apartheid years, universities were in the vanguard of change, being centres of political protest and seeking ways of throwing off the yoke of oppression,” says this commentary about the current staff crisis at the University of KwaZulu-Natal. “The fact is,” the commentary goes on to say, “that at the University of KwaZulu-Natal at least, academic freedom appears to be shrinking rather than growing, and oppression is believed to have returned with a vengeance - the grim irony being that this now appears to be coming, not from outside, but from within the institution itself.”
Globalization intellectuals and political activists, including Marxist economists and organizers, came together to meet on Jan. 18-19 in Bamako, Mali, just before the polycentric World Social Forum opened in this city. The gathering, which was not an official WSF activity but whose invitees also participated in many WSF discussions, issued a statement at the end of the meeting: the Bamako Appeal. The appeal involves promoting discussion and action on a series of points outlining major problems for humanity. These include the need to build a workers' united front and to struggle against imperialist domination and U.S. military hegemony; the problems of peasant societies under threat of destruction from subsidized competition; democratic management of media and cultural diversity; and the struggle against neoliberal and market-driven policies.
* To read the rest of this article visit http://www.workers.org/2006/world/bamako-appeal-0202/
* To read the Bamako appeal, click on the link below.
Following a referral by the UN Security Council in June 2005, the ICC Prosecutor launched an investigation into crimes committed in Darfur, Sudan. His report to the Security Council showed significant evidence of grave crimes. In October 2005, the ICC issued its first arrest warrants for five leaders of the Lord’s Resistance Army – Joseph Kony, Vincent Otti, Raska Lukwiya, Okot Odhiambo, and Dominic Ongwen – charging them with war crimes and crimes against humanity in northern Uganda, including rape and sexual enslavement. In November 2005, the Prosecutor announced that despite major challenges of logistics and security in the ongoing conflict in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), investigations have advanced and arrest warrants are expected in the near future. However, further progress is now threatened by the failure of the governments of Sudan, Uganda and DRC, and of the African Union, to ensure full cooperation with the ICC, says Amnesty International.
This report, by the Forced Migration and Refugee Studies Centre at the American University in Cairo, seeks to shed light on the experiences of refugees, asylum-seekers and migrants temporarily residing in and passing through Libya en route to the EU. It also analyses the notion of protection for refugees and asylum-seekers in Libya both from a legal perspective and as understood by refugees and asylum-seekers themselves.
Located 17 kilometers outside of Nyala, Kalma camp is also one of Darfur’s largest, with nearly 90,000 inhabitants. Most have lived there for nearly two years, fleeing the fighting between rebel groups and government-sponsored Janjaweed militias. There is no Sudanese government presence or police in Kalma camp. After the government police attempted to arrest one of the sheikhs, the angry population chased the police and the government camp managers out, burning down their offices. In retaliation, the Sudanese government has cracked down hard on Kalma, blocking all commercial trade to the camp for months. Recently, the African Union set up a police station inside the camp, bringing some modicum of security.
Over the years, Somali refugees in the Kebribeyah Camp area of Ethiopia have gradually returned to their homeland, but a life-sustaining water system originally installed by the UN refugee agency will remain behind to ease the lives of both the last refugees and the local communities.
Five years ago when Lake Victoria water levels started to fall, nobody thought it would turn out into a national crisis. Even as the fishermen, whose livelihood is wholly dependent on the water, raised an alarm, few expected the current outcry on power outages, rationed water supply and international environmental crisis threatening the livelihoods of over 30 million people.
The Law Society of Kenya plans to sue those adversely mentioned in the Anglo Leasing and Goldenberg scandals. The Society's chairman said the organisation would start private proceedings against suspects in the two scandals once it has gathered enough evidence. In 1994, LSK sued individuals it believed had participated in the Goldenberg scandal.
The new administration in Tanzania has weathered its major political test after the Government declined to heed MPs' demand for higher salaries. The MPs were demanding salaries and other perks that would bring them at par with their counterparts' in other East African countries. Western envoys in Tanzania were reportedly relieved when the Government made its position on MPs' salaries public.
The International Court of Justice has ruled that it does not have jurisdiction to try Rwanda over human rights abuses, alleged plunder and illegal invasion of the DR Congo. Congo brought the charges against Rwanda in 2002. It accused Rwanda of armed aggression, mass slaughter, rape, arbitrary detentions, systematic looting and assassinations. The Hague-based ICJ, also known as the World Court, said as Rwanda had not accepted UN conventions against such crimes as torture and degrading behaviour, on which Congo based its case, it could not make a ruling.
One year after the implementation of the East African Customs Union, its top decision making body has met only once. This has left an array of problems plaguing the economic bloc unresolved. The Council of Ministers has not met since June 2005 after it met in December 2004. The Customs Union came into effect on January 1, 2005.
Militias based in Darfur are launching cross-border raids on villages in Chad on an almost daily basis, killing civilians, burning villages, and stealing cattle in a pattern of attacks that show signs of ethnic bias, according to Human Rights Watch. Human Rights Watch researchers documented numerous cross-border attacks on Chadian villages along the border between Adré, Adé, and Modoyna in eastern Chad since early December 2005. Most of the attacks were by Sudanese and Chadian militiamen from Darfur, some with apparent Sudanese government backing, including helicopter gunship support.
The rhetoric may be flying, with outbursts over "a fool's agreement" and "neo-colonialist and imperialist behaviour," but most observers believe the oil row between the Chadian government and the World Bank will end in a face-saving compromise. The stand-off began in December when Chad's parliament passed an amendment to the law governing how oil revenues can be spent, prompting the World Bank to suspend $124 million in loans and cut the flow of petrodollars to the landlocked, impoverished country.
Faced with impending competition, both Senegal and Gambia's incumbents are preparing the ground for "triple-play" (voice, Internet and "television") services. The sceptics will wonder whether "triple-play" in Gambia is not simply some far-fetched strategic "pipe-dream". But it has a stronger logic than might at first appear to be the case.
An estimated 11 million people in East and the Horn of Africa continue to face critical food shortages brought on by drought and non-natural factors, the International Federation of the Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) has said. "African agriculture appears to be in crisis, and the compounding effect of years of wars, uprising or coups, and civil strife are responsible for causing more hunger than the range of natural problems alone," according to the agency's latest bulletin.
Related Link:
* Africa's food crisis - a systemic crisis
http://www.globalpolicy.org/socecon/develop/africa/2006/0131sistcrisis.htm
World Bank President Paul Wolfowitz, who has sought to cast himself as a champion of transparency, is facing accusations that his office is suppressing a report on a Bank-backed mining project in Africa that allegedly contributed to the deaths of dozens of people. Watchdog groups say that violence has marred the Dikulushi Copper-Silver Mining Project in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) where the bank's guarantee arm, the Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency (MIGA), provided 13.3 million dollars of political risk insurance to the Australian company, Anvil Mining, running the mine.
At least five candidates have registered to contest the presidency of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) in elections set for April while about 300 political parties are expected to participate in the polls. As preparations for DRC's first democratic elections in over 40 years swing into gear, the country's interior ministry announced that it has so far registered some 300 political parties keen on taking part in the polls.
The drought in northern Kenya is increasing conflict between the area's nomadic groups, as they travel further to find scarce pasture, according to a development organization. "It's not just the food crisis that is claiming lives," said Oxfam Kenya head Gezahegn Kebede, warning of further deadly clashes unless more aid arrives. The nomadic groups of northern Kenya, southern Ethiopia, parts of Sudan and Somalia have a history of fighting over livestock and pasture but Oxfam says the drought is increasing tensions.
At Kalma, the largest camp of displaced people in the area with a population pushing 100,000, local police officers are not allowed inside. After violent clashes broke out last year between camp dwellers and local government officials, the police moved their substation out of the camp to a patch of sand nearby. Resources are thinner for the Sudanese police force. Even those officers committed to policing frequently find it hard to do their jobs. Some police posts lack vehicles, while victims must sometimes provide their own pen and paper to fill out a report.
World Bank President Paul Wolfowitz has sworn to crack down on corruption by governments and officials in developing world nations where the bank operates. He has also promised to examine any irregularities within the bank itself, vowing to tackle "difficult issues". Speaking to employees worldwide, Mr Wolfowitz said the bank had to move "more decisively and energetically".
At least 12 people, two of them children, have died from an outbreak of acute watery diarrhoea in the southern Sudanese town of Yei, the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) has said. The outbreak, UNICEF said in a statement, was first reported on 4 February when three deaths occurred and 48 patients were admitted to local health facilities. The disease has left hundreds of people needing medical attention - about half of them children.
Members of the House of Representatives of the Tanzanian island of Zanzibar have endorsed a new education policy intended to make major reforms, including allowing students who fall pregnant to resume their studies after giving birth. For more than 20 years, pregnant Zanzibari girls were forced to leave school permanently. Until the repeal of a law in 2005, they could even be imprisoned.
A recent study and several well-publicised cases of gender violence have raised concern in Malawi, with the president and aid agencies calling for urgent action to address the problem.A survey commissioned by the NGO, ActionAid, the UN Children's Fund (UNICEF) and humanitarian partners, covering over a thousand school-age girls, found that more than half had experienced some form of sexual abuse in schools in Malawi. Urgent measures to curb violence against girls both at home and in schools were recommended.
UNICEF today (February 6) applauded the women and men who are working together to end the practice of female genital mutilation/cutting (FGM/C) and to respect the right of girls to grow to womanhood without harm to their bodies. Throughout sub-Saharan Africa and in Egypt and Sudan a social movement is unfolding to end FGM/C, one of the most persistent, pervasive and silently endured human rights violations. Over the last six years, thousands of villages in West Africa have joined together in public pledging ceremonies to abandon FGM/C, bringing greater hopes of ending the practice globally within a single generation. “We stand at a pivotal moment in history as we work toward a truly positive collective change,” UNICEF Executive Director Ann M. Veneman said Monday, the fourth annual International Day of Zero Tolerance of Female Genital Mutilation.
The African Child Policy Forum is calling for papers from activists, practitioners and academics on “Harmonisation and Implementation of Laws pertaining to Children in Africa.” The papers shall form a major publication by the African Child Policy Forum and UNICEF on harmonization of children’s laws in Africa. A call is made to academics and practitioners in the fields of human rights and children’s rights, in the following countries: - Angola, Botswana, Burundi, Comoros, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Lesotho, Madagascar, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia, Rwanda, South Africa, Swaziliand, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia and Zimbabwe, to submit papers on the extent of extent of the harmonization of all laws, policies and programmes pertaining to children in their country in line with the principles and provisions of the CRC and ACRWC.
The Child Rights Information Network (CRIN) has launched its new website. The website has been redesigned to offer more features and interactive tools, with easy navigation, highlighting latest information added to the site, and using new technology, such as RSS feeds. You can subscribe to our email lists or CRINMAIL on the website and browse for past issues here: http://www.crin.org/email/index.asp
The Cape Town based ISS Corruption and Governance Programme seeks to appoint a Researcher who will assist in implementing an eighteen-month project that proposes to monitor the impact of corruption on service delivery in South Africa and asses the effectiveness of public sector anti-corruption strategies. Although with a strong focus on corruption the project is likely to cover diverse areas of service delivery such as local government, housing, healthcare, social welfare and education.
Realizing Hope is about envisioning and winning a better world. Noam Chomsky from the U.S. says about Realizing Hope: “In many earlier studies, Michael Albert has carried out careful in-depth inquiries into systems of participatory economics (parecon), analyzing in detail how they can function justly, equitably, and efficiently, and how they can overcome many of the criminal features of current social and economic arrangements. This new and very ambitious study casts the net far more widely, extending to just about every major domain of human concern and mode of human interaction, and investigating with care and insight how, in these domains, parecon-like principles could lead to a far more desirable society than anything that exists, and also how these goals can be constructively approached. It is another very valuable and provocative contribution to the quest for a world of much greater freedom and justice."
UNFPA is currently receiving applications for its Special Youth Programme for 2006. This programme seeks to recruit young people aged 20-24 from developing countries with some programme experience in development issues to join UNFPA for a 9-month remunerated fellowship.
UN delegates drafting a treaty to protect the rights of the world's 600 million disabled have resolved many of their differences and are on track to complete the document in August, the diplomat leading the negotiations has said. ''It should be possible to conclude drafting at our next meeting in August,'' New Zealand Ambassador Don MacKay told a news conference after a three-week drafting session. ''We have made real progress and there are relatively few unresolved issues,'' he said. ''But it is more than just dotting the i's and crossing the t's.'' A UN committee that includes all 191 UN member-nations has been working since 2001 on a treaty to promote and protect the rights of the disabled.
Reporting to the Regional Director, the RHC will facilitate the acquisition of emergency preparedness, prevention, mitigation, and response and recovery skills within Oxfam America’s regional offices, partners, and partner communities. During times of emergency, the RHC will perform the designated activities under direct supervision and in consultation with the Regional Director as the designated “Humanitarian Lead,” activating Humanitarian Response Department support, coordinating with the regional office, activating the Oxfam International and partner’s network, and otherwise implementing contingency plans.
Donors and recipient governments are increasingly preferring General Budget Support to other forms of aid: development aid delivered directly into national budgets. This now accounts for 20 to 40 percent of government aid in many African countries. The results for development and poverty reduction have been mixed.
Several countries in the Southern African region, have jointly initiated a massive hydropower plant, that will have the capacity and potential to generate power for the entire African continent, with the possible exportation of the surplus to Europe. The Inga project estimated to cost $7bn is aimed at addressing the looming energy shortages in the region, but it will also bring huge socio-economic benefits, to the five countries involved.
Different arms of the government are at one another's throats over a proposed 21-storey dam on a major river that passes through the Kruger National Park and feeds Mozambique. South African National Parks (SANParks) has threatened legal action against its principal, the Department of Environmental Affairs and Tourism, and the Department of Water Affairs and Forestry, according to the Mail and Guardian.
The Southern and Eastern Africa Consortium for Monitoring the Quality of Education (SACMEQ) started ten years ago as an experimental research project of the UNESCO International Institute for Educational Planning (IIEP). Today, it has grown into a respected inter-governmental agency that designs and implements research and training programmes across 14 counties reports the latest edition of IIEP's newsletter.
UNESCO is supporting an innovative teacher training initiative that is expected to improve the quality of instruction and learning in schools across Eritrea by training teachers on learner-centred interactive pedagogy. Teachers will learn new methodologies and how to apply them in classroom settings, even where class sizes are large.
Free Primary Education was introduced in Kenya in 2003, enabling 1.3 million poor children to obtain schooling for the first time. However, a UNESCO/OECD Early Childhood Policy Review Mission noted that the policy had a negative impact on early childhood development centres serving poor children. The main reason for this phenomenon is that poor parents are now keeping their children at home until they reach the age of primary school. They refuse to pay for early childhood education on the grounds that this, like primary education, should also be free.
"King Mswati's time is up," headlined South Africa's Sunday Times last month after arrests and reports of torture of banned opposition party members in Swaziland. But with inauguration of a new constitution entrenching the powers of the monarchy, the prospects for democracy in this small country neighboring South Africa do not seem promising. Despite popular discontent with the country's poverty, and the contrast with its ruler's lavish lifestyle, Swazis are reported to be afraid to speak out as well as preoccupied with immediate issues such as AIDS. The Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU) and Amnesty International have condemned the stepped up repression, but there has been no public concern expressed by the South African government.
International Aid Report will become your first port of call when you need a comprehensive analysis of trends and key developments in this sector. Articles on a wide range of themes will give you an informal, critical and challenging perspective on the key issues affecting donors, implementers and recipients of aid. Bilateral / Multilateral donors and private foundations will use it to help set priorities and guidelines for their funding decisions. NGO's will stay aware of where donors are spending their money and any shifts in spending patterns. This will help to not only secure funding but also to understand the changing priorities of donor funding.
The debate is intensifying over how local communities should share the benefits of research based on Africa's biodiversity while protecting the intellectual property rights of the researchers involved. As the UN Convention on Biological Diversity meets in Spain this week (February 2) for international negotiations on this and other issues, some environmental groups say it should declare a moratorium on foreign researchers using biological resources until it can sort out rules on how benefits can be shared fairly, according to SciDev.
An organisation promoting collaboration between African chemists will be launched on 23 February in the Ethiopian capital Addis Ababa. The Federation of African Societies of Chemistry will create a network of African chemists to encourage cooperation and help disseminate research results. It also aims to improve chemistry teaching, and raise public understanding of chemistry and its role in economic development. The federation's activities will include publishing a newsletter and organising workshops and scientific meetings, reports www.scidev.net.
Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak has unveiled plans to provide 500 university scholarships for students from other African nations over the next ten years. Foreign minister Ahmed Abul Gheit made the announcement on Mubarak's behalf at last week's African Union (AU) summit in Sudan. "The development of African societies should be based on an advanced and strong infrastructure of education, culture and scientific research systems in order to bridge the digital and scientific gaps [that are] steadily increasing between developing and developed countries," said the statement.
South African families say school fees often are unaffordable and are robbing their children of an education, even though national laws there expressly guarantee free schooling for impoverished youths. UNICEF, the World Bank and other rights groups are encouraging officials there and in other African countries to provide universal free education, denied most frequently to girls.
Halting arms sales to Africa would help address the continent's poverty more than charity or debt relief, said Dennis McNamara, special United Nations adviser on internal displacement. Gun imports from the West facilitate African conflicts that foster homelessness and expose Africans to war crimes, hunger, disease and rape, McNamara said.
Zimbabwean NGOs said they were ‘disappointed’ that the African Union (AU) had failed to acknowledge a resolution passed by its rights body, criticising the Harare regime. The AU summit in Khartoum, Sudan, which concluded this week, declined to take up the resolution tabled by its African Commission on Human and Peoples' Rights (ACHPR), saying the Zimbabwe government had not had time to react. ‘We understand that the government has to be given time to respond, but at least the summit should have noted the report,’ said Tor-Hugne Olsen, international office coordinator of the Zimbabwe Human Rights Forum, a coalition of 17 Zimbabwean NGOs.
The tools in this kit are specifically geared towards the needs of researchers and practitioners in civil society organisations (CSOs), including development NGOs, research institutes, think tanks, universities and networks. The toolkit addresses the questions of how researchers and CSOs can best communicate evidence in order to inform or influence policy, to achieve their own stated development objectives, or simply to make their own knowledge accessible and understandable to a wider audience.
This book brings together a comprehensive list of the facts and figures regarding violence against women in daily life, during war and conflict and in post-conflict situations. The authors map the pervasiveness of violence against women, analyse strategies to prevent and punish that violence and highlight the key role that women play in initiatives to counter violence. The document argues that violence against women must be recognised as a key issue in its own right, as one of the significant causes of death on our planet - comparable in importance only to war, hunger and disease.
In 2006, GCE will continue to build on the amazing campaigning success of previous years, maintaining and increasing pressure on rich and poor countries alike to take urgent action towards achieving Education for All. The theme for the week, April 24-30, is: Every child needs a teacher. Right now, over 100 million children wake up every day without the hope that education offers.
This practical guide outlines the challenges faced in changing male perceptions of paid sex with women. The document provides details of a three day course run by the Coalition Against Trafficking in Women which aimed to provide young men with a critical understanding of violence against women, particularly prostitution, and move towards a change of attitude and treatment of women. The guide also focuses on the production of teaching materials and options available for resourcing the education aspect of a programme.
This report presents national sex disaggregated statistics in such areas as demographics, health, education, work, violence against women, poverty, human rights and decision-making. The report reviews and analyses the current availability of data and assesses progress made in the provision of national statistics, as opposed to internationally prepared estimates, relevant to gender concerns during the past 30 years. It proposes a set of strategies to strengthen national capacity to collect and report statistics and also for improved mainstreaming of gender concerns.
Proposals for a long-awaited U.N. Human Rights Council call for 45 members and beefed up standards for any nation wanting a seat on the new body, according to a draft resolution circulated on Thursday (February 2). World leaders agreed at a U.N. summit in September to create a new body to replace the 53-member Geneva-based Human Rights Commission, known for giving seats to countries such as Sudan and Zimbabwe and blocking criticism of rights abusers. The aim of the 191-member General Assembly is to approve the document by February 15 so that the new council, which will also sit in Geneva, is ready to take over from the commission that is to have its final session, beginning in mid-March, according to Reuters.
Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi on Wednesday (February 1) said rights groups' allegations of widespread abuse of political opponents had no basis in fact and were the result of "sloppy" reporting. London-based Amnesty International said earlier in the day that Ethiopia had arrested thousands of students from the Oromo ethnic group in a crackdown following anti-government demonstrations since November over a disputed election. The whereabouts of many of the detainees were not known, the group said. "Some detainees have been released, but others are being held in locations where torture has frequently been reported," Amnesty added in an urgent appeal. But Meles, in an interview with Reuters, scoffed at the Amnesty report as based on second-hand, biased information.
Campaign 88 Days is an effort to raise awareness, take action and mobilise resources for women's rights worldwide. In the 88 days between December 10, 2005, International Human Rights Day and March 8 2006, International Women’s Day, you can help keep women safe from domestic and sexual violence, guarantee them equal treatment in the work force, push governments to do what’s right for women, and support groundbreaking initiatives. Together with your support we can change the world in 88 days. Because women’s rights are human rights…
Tanzania has been forced to introduce daytime power cuts because a drought has severely reduced the amount of electricity being supplied to the national grid, the country's energy minister said on Thursday (February 2). The water level at the Mtera dam has fallen so low that hydroelectric power can no longer be generated there, the Minister for Energy and Natural Resources, Ibrahim Msabah, announced. Other power stations are producing well below capacity. "From this situation we have been obliged to start limited load sharing in the whole of the country for at least eight hours," Msabah said.
At least two million registered voters are expected to turn up at polling stations without voters' cards, Daily Monitor has learnt. The Electoral Commission announced last week (February 2) that, due to delays in cleaning up the national voters' register, registered voters will be allowed to cast their votes in the forthcoming elections even if they do not have cards, as long as they can identify themselves. "People who registered in the recent update do not have cards and they are about two million," the EC Database Manager, Mr Pontius Namugera said in an interview. Namugera said the number is likely to be higher because the Commission has not distributed all the 8.5 million voters' cards it ordered.
The National Assembly Joint Committee on the review of the 1999 Constitution succumbed yesterday (February 1) to massive public pressure and stepped down the controversial report recommending a third term for the President and governors. Moments before the committee’s resolution, the Northern Members Forum in the National Assembly had declared that it remained undaunted in its opposition to the plan, in spite of its endorsement by state governors at their Abuja meeting on Monday. After a charged meeting, the enlarged Mantu Committee resolved to adopt the 1999 Constitution as the working document during the proposed public hearing on the new Constitution.
South African Women in Dialogue is taking the initiative of "bringing the ideas of African presidents" to the people as part of the African Union's Peer Review Mechanism, a self assessment process now underway in South Africa. The president of the Pan African Parliament, Gertrude Mongella, has asked First Lady, Zanele Mbeki, if she would assist in launching a formation similar to SAWID in other African countries.
The judge due to hear the treason trial of Uganda's opposition leader has withdrawn from the case, saying there was a perception he would be biased. Judge John Bosco Katutsi described the view as "absolute rubbish" but said a judge should be above suspicion. He said he had had sleepless nights and his health had suffered. He is the second judge to withdraw from a case concerning Kizza Besigye - expected to be the strongest challenger in elections due on 23 February.
Nigeria deserves to become a permanent member of the Security Council, partly because of its outstanding record of contributing to international peacekeeping and also since it is "the largest black democracy in the world, which respects the tenets and principles of human rights of her citizens," Emmanuel Onwubiko, a commissioner on Nigeria's National Human Rights Commission, writes in the Daily Independent.
Kenya's Ministry of Water and Irrigation has warned of a severe water shortage in the region unless the existing sources are protected. In a report entitled "The Draft National Water Resources Management Strategy, 2005-2007," the ministry gives a damning indictment of the management of Kenya's natural environment and its accompanying water resources over the past 30 years.
The International Finance Corporation, the World Bank's private-sector lending arm, on Tuesday (January 31) approved $125 million in loans for gold major Newmont Mining Corp.'s Ahafo project in Ghana, but not all countries on the IFC's 24-member board agreed it was a good move, reports Reuters. Board officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said three countries abstained and one objected during discussions on the project, amid concerns about the environmental impact and resettlement of families that were living on the mine's site.
Cameroon's political and business elites have been rocked by a campaign by tabloid newspapers to "out" top personalities they say are homosexual. The newspaper editors say they are exposing people who engage in "deviant behaviour". Some 50 people have been named and the papers have sold out. Homosexual acts are banned in Cameroon, with up to five years in jail. But the campaign has been condemned by the state communication council for invading people's private lives. The council also challenged anyone who felt they had been libelled to take legal action. So far, none of those named has gone to the courts.