The First Criminal Bench of the Federal High Court on 3 April 2002 sentenced Ms Lubaba Sa-id, former Editor-in-chief of Tarik newspaper, to one year inprison for disseminating "fabricated news that could have negative psychological effect on members of the Defence Army and cause disturbances in the minds of the people."

Amid accusations off financial mismanagement, secrecy, and lack of focus, the anonymous organization that manages the Internet is working to impose sweeping changes to itself that in the long run will fundamentally affect what people around the world can do online.

Egypt is one of the continent's largest two connectivity markets, the other being South Africa. The country spans both Africa and the Middle East and is therefore a key business centre for both markets. It has used the density of internet access it has already built up to pioneer the possibility of even greater levels of penetration through a free internet access initiative. It has also used its geographically advantageous position to develop an internet data centre offering server hosting among other things. Read about this, and more, in News Update this week.

BONN/NEW YORK, 9 April 2002 -- The United Nations Volunteers programme (UNV) and NetAid have named 10 outstanding online volunteers in recognition of the exemplary support they have given to development organizations worldwide through online volunteering.

THE Ugandan press is facing a new threat. It is the Anti Terrorism Bill passed by Parliament recently. The Bill has very serious implications not only for the press freedom but also the freedoms of speech and expression.

FREE monthly listings of women's groups & events worldwide.

Stay informed. Register to AIDSchannel.org's weekly email digest to receive our top stories, features and analysis. Every Wednesday, you can receive the top HIV/AIDS stories from AIDSchannel.org. AIDSchannel.org delivers straight to your desktop:
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EngenderHealth has released online minicourses on sexually transmitted
infections and HIV and AIDS. They aim to provide healthcare providers, especially those in resource-poor settings, with knowledge and strategies for HIV/AIDS and STI prevention, management and counselling with their clients. They are also available on CD-ROM from Carrie Svingen.

SAGBVHI plans to host an annual conference on gender based violence and
health in April 2002. Set to become an annual event, the conference will
attempt to raise awareness about intersection between gender based violence
and health and to find creative ways of building a violent free society.
Awards from the SAGBVHI will be given to researchers to encourage research
in specific areas of gender based violence and health. Further information: Naomi Webster.

CALL FOR PAPERS
The Department of Women and Gender Studies, Makerere University, Kampala, Uganda is organizing the Womens Worlds 2002, 8th International Interdisciplinary Congress on Women, making Uganda the first African country to host the congress. The congress will be held between the 21st - 26th July, 2002 at Makerere University Campus in Kampala, Uganda. Women's Worlds congress is an international interdisciplinary congress on women held every three years. The focus of the congress is gender research and interdisciplinary scholarship. The first Women's Worlds Congress took place in 1981, in Israel. Since then other Congresses have taken place in Netherlands (1984), Ireland (1987), USA (1990), Costa Rica (1993), Australia (1996), and Norway (1999).

London, United Kingdom. The dynamic campaign organisation supporting peace, democracy and development in Southern Africa needs a Director to build on recent successes and lead ACTSA in its next critical phase of development. You'll need a proven ability for managing an organisation and its finances; experience of developing fundraising initiatives and strong communication skills.

Niger. Under the general supervision of the Chief of the ECA’s West Africa Sub-Regional Development Centre (WA-SRDC), the incumbent undertakes activities, particularly in the areas of monetary and fiscal policy, debt, capital markets development, resource mobilization for financing development, international finance and trade, and sub-regional economic cooperation and integration. In the context of African countries, the incumbent will engage in the SRDC’s work that includes coordinating and conducting macroeconomic research and analysis; designing econometric models, proposing economic and social policies; analyzing trends and economic performance in African countries; assessing needs for human resources, financing, and institutional frameworks; and promoting sub-regional collaboration on data collection and exchange, conferences, and training. Closing date: 23 April, 2002.

CfBT, a leading provider of education services, is managing a DFID funded programme with the Government of Rwanda and other donors to improve education as part of an overall poverty reduction programme. CfBT seeks to appoint a Primary Education Planning and Management Adviser who will assist the Rwandan Ministry of Education in achieving its target of UPE by 2010, a key part of the national planning for achieving Education For All. Located in the Ministry of Education in Kigali, the role will involve working closely with the Director of Primary Education and other parties in providing professional advice and support, developing plans, programmes and targets to address the key issues of access, equity, quality and efficiency.

The Southern Africa Institute of Fundraising (SAIF) has brought together a wealth of international experience for this Convention. It will be overflowing with opportunities to grow Africa's resource mobilisation and development skills. Whether you are a new fundraiser or have been in the field for many years, the programme will excite you.

The Eastern Cape village of Tswilita has launched a pioneering effort in digital connection of rural areas in the province.

In a country-specific development programme for countries emerging from conflict, the World bank will loan Sierra Leone over US $140-million.

Swedish government has agreed to provide SEK 8-million (US $773,320) aid to be channeled through UN agencies. A Significant portion will be used for the reintegration of ex-combatants.

According to press reports USAid will continue to assist South Africa's fight against Aids despite Mbeki's ''tragic'' stance on the disease.

The IMF has approved a three- year credit for Côte d’Ivoire’s integrated poverty alleviation strategy.

The International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) will embark on a fundraising drive for it's voluntary trust fund. The funds will be used for outreach programmes in Rwanda and programme activities of the Tribunal.

The Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) and the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa held a four-day meeting to articulate policies to stimulate the participation of women in development in West Africa.

UNIFEM has announced the formation of a unique Global Advisory Committee comprised of African IT entrepreneurs living in the Diaspora and in Africa, as well as representatives from the private sector and the UN system.

The Women’s Caucus at the meeting on Financing for Development were alarmed that the meeting on Financing for Development was used as a venue for subverting development and advancing the militarist goals of the U.S. government’s “war on terrorism”.

The Ceasefire Campaign invites you to its AGM. The Guest Speaker will be Gavin Woods and the topic will be "The Arms Deal -- What next?".

SANGONeT is offering the following courses during April / May 2002: Troubleshooting, Information Literacy Training, and HTML and Web Publishing.

A People Daily editor, Mr Mukalo wa Kwayera, has been arrested by police. Kwayera was arrested minutes after appearing in court where he and a former People editor, Mr Vitalis Musebe, are facing charges of publishing information from the Armed Forces.

This article from Jeffrey Harrow summarises the state of current wireless technology and explains what the various acronyms and terminolgies mean. Wireless is becoming more and more significant in Africa.

In this issue of News Update, read about cyber cafe rate hikes in Kenya, GSM news in Egypt and new appointments at Africa Online.

Three years ago I downloaded a program that would make my desktop PC part of the Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence (SETI) project. Distributed computing has come a long way since then. This special feature provides links to excellent resources on the topic, including projects like medical research around cancer and AIDS.

In all countries of the world there exists traditional knowledge related to the health of humans and animals. The interest in traditional knowledge is more and more widely recognised in development policies, the media and scientific literature. In Africa, traditional healers and remedies made from plants play an important role in the health of millions of people.

As the international community, Zanu-PF and MDC decide what to do next we look at the opinions of activists over what should happen next.

Zimbabwe's trade unions have called for a three-day general strike against President Robert Mugabe's government while Africa's two most powerful leaders appeared to make little headway in resolving the country's pressing political and economic crisis.

Zimbabwe has become the latest by-word for bad governance in Africa. But its criminal regime still has much support. South Africa, that "rainbow nation" of new democracy a mere eight years ago, faces a serious credibility problem in explaining how its own observer mission legitimized Zimbabwe's electoral process while the Commonwealth and SADC delegations in which it is a major player managed to reach the widely-held and opposite conclusion that the poll was a blatant fraud.

The Zimbabwe Election Support Network (ZESN) has been monitoring the 2002 Presidential Elections since the general parliamentary elections in the year 2000. The pre-election period has been marked by the following developments:

Overall, the 2002 Zimbabwean Presidential elections were a challenging exercise, and the authorities charged with conducting the elections discharged their work satisfactorily, except for the decision to reduce the number of polling stations in some urban areas - a decision which resulted in certain instances in excessively long queues and the extension of polling hours in most stations and days in Harare and Chitungwiza.

Corruption among governments, politicians and businessmen endangers the world's efforts to ease poverty, according to leaders of a United Nations conference on aid and economic development that opened on Tuesday.

THE political climate in Zambia appears to be more dramatic considering the stand our President has taken to declare "war against corruption." This is a very courageous move taken by President Mwanawasa though it is a long process. His declaration marks the beginning of what we can call "The Mother of all battles."

Almost 11 million children, most of them babies, die each year of preventable causes, according to United Nations officials meeting to hammer out a strategy to save more young lives.

This UNESCO initiative aims to gauge the current state of knowledge among those involved in open and distance learning (ODL) in developing countries in order to determine the best way to support efforts in that area.

The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, a new initiative to combat the epidemics that kill six million people each year, announced the appointment of an international panel of experts that will review all grant proposals and make recommendations to the Board for funding.

The UN refugee agency in Tanzania has denied allegations of corruption and intimidation by officials dealing with refugees, saying that many of the claims are slight and give little to investigate, while others are untrue.

Mountain areas are characterized by a close interaction between natural processes and human activities, and by a sometimes difficult relationship between highlands and lowlands. In the last twenty years, and even more so since Rio 1992, new driving forces have become evident: globalisation, urbanisation and a growing divide between the rich and the poor parts of the world from the human side, and climate-environmental change from the natural side. Traditional knowledge, the experience of generations and even centuries, has been overrun by these external driving forces reinforced by modern information and communication technologies. We don't yet know the consequences for mountain ecosystems and mountain communities. Understanding these processes and managing this growing complexity for sustainable development requires new ideas and new tools for education, new objectives and approaches for science and a much better understanding of cultural foundations.

As part of the process in the preparations for the World Summit on Sustainable Development, national reporting templates for governments and stakeholders to conduct a review of progress in the national commitments in Agenda 21 are being placed on the Earth Summit 2002 website. Two new National Review Templates are now online - Demographic Dynamics - Agenda 21, Chapter 5, and Promoting Health - Agenda 21, Chapter 6.

Rapid industrialization in Nigeria during the 1970's saw the establishment of car assembly plants, breweries and distilleries,detergent and cement manufacturing,textile and paper mills, food and beverage processing factories. This sudden rise in national wealth was not accompanied by careful planning in respect of environmental impacts. In Nigeria, despite warnings from non-governmental organisations, international multilateral agencies and researchers, the rate of industrialization continues to outstrip initiatives to manage and protect the environment. Atmospheric pollution in Nigeria is manifested chiefly by the flaring of gas at the oil company flow stations in the Niger Delta, by rampant unchecked emissions from manufacturing, automobiles and generating set exhausts, by open solid waste incineration and from slash and burn agriculture. Air quality degrading substances of major concern in Nigeria include sulphur dioxide, hydrogen sulphide, nitrogen oxide, cement kiln dust and other particulate matter and heavy metals. The contributors to this new publication focus on various aspects of air pollution within their own fields of expertise. The perspectives range from ecological sustainability and coastal pollution to urban degradation and law enforcement. The contributors address the institutional failure to identify sources of air pollution,monitor the levels and impacts of pollutants and enforce environmental legislation and suggest ways of creating awareness of the effects of air pollution and improving upon ecological efficiency in industrial production.

How can rural radio help to construct better relationships between technical science and humanity? Could a project link up and begin to improve the attitudes, skills and knowledge-sharing of scientists and farmers through rural radio? These were some of the questions asked by ISNAR and its partners in a new effort to support researchers working together with radio broadcasters and rural societies.

Zambia Plc Ltd, of which every Zambian young and old is a shareholder, is now one of the poorest countries in the world. One does not need to be a Harvard University graduate or Oxford economist to be able to analyze the current socio-economic mess now prevailing in Zambia.” Poverty in Zambia” is acute” and can be felt and smelt everywhere.

The prosecution in the so-called "Media Trial" produced news articles before judges at the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) to prove that genocide suspect Ferdinand Nahimana was a presidential advisor based in Gisenyi Province in July 1994.

A Row has broken out over the suspension last week of the head of the body organising the massive meeting of nongovernmental organisations (NGOs) ahead of the United Nations summit on sustainable development. Meanwhile, the head of the NGO that was pushed aside from leading the management effort for the meeting, has accused government of wanting to control the agenda of the meeting to prevent criticism of the New Partnership for Africa's Development (Nepad).