A landmark ruling on 12 October by Gaborone’s High Court found that gender discrimination based on Botswana’s customary law is unconstitutional. The court ruled on a case brought by three sisters, all over 65 years old, challenging a Ngwaketse customary law that holds the right of inheritance to the family home belongs to the youngest son. 'Critically, the judge made it clear that discrimination cannot be justified on cultural grounds before rejecting out of hand the argument put forward by the Attorney General that Botswana society was not ready for [gender] equality,' Priti Patel, deputy director of the Southern Africa Litigation Centre (SALC), said in a statement. SALC supported the sisters’ case.

Green Berets from the famous 10th Special Forces Group (Airborne) out of Fort Carson, Colorado, trained with the Botswana Defense Forces Special Forces (BDFSF) on marksmanship, close quarter battle, medical and tracking training in an effort to strengthen relationships and to promote and support Special Operations Capabilities. This was all part of field training exercises called 'Eastern Piper 12'. Exercise Eastern Piper 12, conducted by US Africa Command (AFRICOM) and Special Operations Command, Africa (SOCAF), was a three week Foreign International Defense (FID) structured counter-terrorism base exercise, which took place at the Thebepatswa Air Base in Gaborone, Botswana.

While Botswana’s government has never officially admitted to forcibly relocating the G/wi and G//ana communities of the Basarwa indigenous group to make way for diamond-mining operations in the Central Kalahari Game Reserve (CKGR), critics have long suspected this to be the main motivation for the removals. When it became known in late 2010 that Gem Diamonds would begin mining operations in the CKGR, suspicions seem to have been confirmed. Basarwa were granted the rights to occupy land within the CKGR, as a result of a court ruling in 2006, after years of attempted negotiations, struggle and litigation. There is concern over monitoring and ensuring that the needs of the communities in the CKGR are met, says this article from