On 7 May, police authorities in the Ugandan city of Gulu – a city located approximately 320km north of Kampala by road with 150,000 inhabitants – ‘dropped by’ a sex worker drop-in centre. They raided the small office and arrested two staff and three members of the Women’s Organization Network for Human Rights Advocacy (WONETHA), a duly-registered group that runs the centre. 'We find this to be an attack on WONETHA and sex workers’ freedom of association, assembly, speech and expression, and we strongly protest against this,' says a release by Macklean Kyomya, WONETHA’s Executive director.

Drawing on the Land Matrix database, this paper contains an in depth analysis of large-scale agricultural land transactions that entail a transfer of rights to use, control or own land, that have been concluded since the year 2000. It particularly focuses on (i) land acquisitions or investments targeting the Global South and Eastern Europe; (ii) transnational deals, excluding deals where only domestic actors are involved;(iii) and deals where the envisioned land use is agricultural.

Clinical trials are underway to test a new treatment for pregnant women, which could tackle some of the leading preventable causes of death for babies in sub-Saharan Africa, researchers at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine (LSHTM) said. A large number of pregnant women in sub-Saharan Africa are infected with both malaria and sexually transmitted - reproductive tract infections (STIs - RTIs), according to a new study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association.

Everlyne Wanjiku, a single mother of five, has earned a living selling vegetables in the sprawling Kibera slum in Nairobi, Kenya, for over three decades. And even though her earnings were meagre, she was able to provide all her children with a tertiary education. But now, like her many fellow poverty-stricken slum dwellers in this East African nation, she is feeling the pinch of the high cost of food and other commodities, which have skyrocketed globally.

More than 70 000 illegal abortions are carried out in Zimbabwe every year, with Zimbabwean women running a 200 times greater risk of dying of abortion complications than their counterparts in South Africa, where the procedure is legal.

The WSF Free Palestine will be a global encounter of broad-based popular and civil society mobilizations.

The Saudi Labor Ministry has begun taking steps toward canceling the highly controversial individual kafala, or sponsorship, system, the Saudi newspaper Al-Eqtisadia reported on Monday, quoting a ministry official. The sponsorship system, which is applied in Saudi Arabia and other Gulf countries, raises concerns over foreign workers’ rights.

A UN report indicates that the rebels of the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR) have killed at least 50 civilians in eastern region of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) since the beginning of May. 'Since the start of this month, at least 50 people - including displaced persons - have been killed by presumed FDLR members under similar conditions,' the United Nations humanitarian agency OCHA said.

Reporters Without Borders has deplored community radio presenter Habarugira Epaphrodite's detention since 24 April in the main prison of Gitarama, the capital of Muhanga district, on a charge of 'minimizing' the 1994 Tutsi genocide and 'spreading genocide ideology'. Epaphrodite was arrested because, while reading a report about ceremonies marking the 18th anniversary of the genocide on community radio Huguka's morning new broadcast on 22 April, he mixed up the Kinyarwanda words for 'victims' and 'survivors', making it sound as though he approved of the genocide.

A tenuous peace has taken hold in Libya’s southwestern city of Sebha more than a month after tribal clashes killed at least 70 people, with tensions still high between communities living here, many of whom have their own armed militias, according to local residents. The latest clashes erupted in March between the Tubu ethnic group and the Arab Awlad Sulayman and Awlad Abu Seif tribes. The clashes are said to have begun after a man belonging to the Abu Seif family was killed allegedly by the Tubu. But other narratives suggest the conflict followed a dispute over several million dollars which the ruling Transitional National Council (TNC) was planning to spend in Sebha.

Niger employees of Areva must benefit from the same compensation as their French colleagues, a Niger non-governmental organisation said Friday after a court near Paris said the French state-owned nuclear firm was liable. The court at Melun ordered 200,000 euros ($260,000) in damages to be paid by France's state health fund to the widow of an employee of the Areva subsidiary Cominak, a Niger company which runs an Areva uranium mine at Akokan. The deceased, Serge Venel, died of lung cancer in July 2009 at the age of 59.

InsightsAfrica is an interactive tool providing critical data about the online behavior of urban consumers in six key African markets: Ghana, Kenya, Nigeria, Senegal, South Africa and Uganda.

Female protesters continue to participate in pro-democracy demonstrations that remain deadly more than a year after President Hosni Mubarak was overthrown. Primary school teacher Reham El Hakim, for instance, was on the front lines on 5 May when the 12th person was killed during demonstrations against the military government in Abbasaiya. It's now commonplace, however, to hear people say that the military government and Islamic politicians, who did not at first approve of the anti-Mubarak demonstrations, have 'hijacked' the revolution, reports

Several political parties, largely Islamists, are challenging the results of Algeria's legislative election. The National Liberation Front (FLN) came away with 220 out of a possible 462 seats in the People's National Assembly, according to the preliminary tally released Friday (11 May). But those displeased with the outcome have spoken of irregularities and alleged fraud in the way the election process was handled.

During almost 20 years of exile in Guinea, Joseph did not know if his family was alive or dead. When he recently found out by chance that they had survived the attack that caused him to flee his native Liberia, he decided he must go back. 'For the first time, I am eager to return home. I want to see my family,' said the 55-year-old fisherman, who is joining a growing number of Liberian refugees who are returning home with UNHCR help before they lose refugee status.

18th May, 2012 Royal Commonwealth Society in London

8.30-18.00hrs

SPEAKERS INCLUDE:

• Dr AlisonBisset
• Prof .ColmCampbell
• Mrs CarlaFerstman*
• Mr CourtneyGriffiths*
• Mr DonaldDeya
• Mrs FatouBensouda*
• Prof. HansKo?echler
• Hon. JusticeAwaNanaDaboya*
• Mr Luis Moreno-Ocampo*
• Prof. MaxduPlessis
• DrPaulMoorcraft
• Dr Sarah Nouwen
• Prof.StephenChan
• Dr Suleiman Baldo
• Prof. Susana Sa? Couto
• Prof. Tim Alley
• Dr William Pace

*To be confirmed

As the ICC approaches its tenth anniversary and makes its first conviction, we cordially invite you to participate in an engaging and enlightening one- day debate to review the effectiveness of this highly controversial court. Through this forum we will assess the role of the court and its impact especially in Africa, where all of its indictments have been made. We will look at alternative solutions in the administration of justice to achieve reconciliation and the restoration of peace. Bringing together some of the most knowledgeable and experienced experts from the fields of law, academia and civil society, as well as policy makers, this unique one-day forum will seek to determine whether the court has met its mandate, how it works and its impact. We will also discuss what can and should be done to resolve and deal with some critical issues which affect the stability of many countries across Africa and the world.

ATTENDANCE IS FREE BY INVITATION

Registration is essential:

or contact Toma?s Paquete at +44 (0) 20 7841 3237 or [email][email protected]
Organised by IC Events

Struggle to end Israel’s oppression and international complicity continues.

Hundreds of families living in a camp for internally displaced people in Carrefour, in Haiti's capital Port-au-Prince, are being harassed and intimidated and are at imminent risk of forced eviction. Residents at Grace Village camp, in the Carrefour area of Metropolitan Port-au-Prince are at imminent risk of forced eviction. At least 30 families have already been forcibly evicted, after their shelters and belongings were destroyed during the night of 28 April. They were forced to leave their properties without any due process and without being offered any alternative accommodation.

The sentencing of a rapper on 11 May 2012 to one year in prison for 'insulting the police' shows the gap between the strong free-expression language in Morocco's 2011 constitution and the continuing intolerance for those who criticize state institutions, Human Rights Watch said. The sentence was handed down one week before the opening of the international Mawazine music festival in Rabat, which is held under the patronage of King Mohammed VI. Mouad Belghouat, better known as 'al-Haqed' (the sullen one), has been in pretrial custody since March 29 because of his rap song 'Kilab ed-Dowla' (Dogs of the State), which denounces police corruption, and a YouTube video set to the song.

The world's wildlife has declined by nearly a third over the past 40 years, a new estimate of the health of the planet suggests. In some parts the figure is much higher - in the tropics, losses are estimated at more than 50 per cent, while in tropical freshwater ecosystems specifically, average losses may be as high as 70 per cent, according to the 2012 edition of the Living Planet Report, produced by the WWF.