Despite claims of a boom in Tanzania’s mining industry, the bulk of taxes paid to the government comprises deductions from the workers’ wages and not levies on extracted minerals, it has been revealed. At least 54.5 per cent of the taxes collected from mining, gas and oil companies in the country is being paid by ordinary workers in form of various taxes, according to a new report released here yesterday by the Tanzania Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (TEITI).

Tunisia and Italy have agreed to work together to counter illegal immigration after thousands of people arrived on the tiny island of Lampedusa. According to Tap, Tunisia's official news agency, an agreement between Italy's foreign minister and Tunisia's interim prime minister was made late on Monday night. Under the deal, Italy will give Tunisia practical aid including a 'network of radars and fast boats that will be operated by Tunisians', the agency quoted Franco Frattini, the Italian minister, as saying.

These are strategic weaknesses that global anti-capitalist civil society has to confront as part of the build up to COP17 in South Africa, says this Red Pepper article. '...the build up to COP17 has to harness global public opinion around the alternatives represented by Bolivia and anti-capitalist civil society. The role of global pubic opinion, of over 6 billion humans on the planet, is crucial to democratise the climate change negotiations.'

The UNCAC Coalition, a group of over 240 civil society organisations in more than 100 countries, including the Afro-Egyptian Human Rights Organisation (AEHRO) and NADAFA-Egyptians against corruption, is deeply concerned about public wealth illicitly transferred out of Egypt. A report by Global Financial Integrity released in January 2011 finds that Egypt is losing more than US$6 billion per year - US$57.2 billion in total from 2000 to 2008 - to illicit financial activities and official government corruption. Earlier this week, allegations were published about the wealth of Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak and his family. This wealth should be thoroughly investigated, and if illicitly transferred should be immediately frozen and then repatriated.

Bt cotton has increased crop yields for small farmers in southern India, a study has confirmed. But the increase is less than claimed by some studies, is unlikely to be sustainable and has come at a substantial cost to the farmers.

The American Political Science Association (APSA) is accepting participant applications for its fourth Africa Workshop, entitled 'Representation Reconsidered: Ethnic Politics and Africa's Governance Institutions in Comparative Perspective.' It will take place 23 July to 6 August, 2011 at the Institute for Development Studies (IDS) at the University of Nairobi. The organisers, with a grant secured from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, will cover all the costs of participation (travel, lodging, meals, daily stipend, and materials) for up to 23 qualified applicants (20 African, plus 3 based in the US). Professional fluency in English is absolutely required. Because the workshop will have a strong cross-regional component, US-based PhD students with expertise in either Africa or Latin America are encouraged to apply. African scholars of all social science fields with a graduate degree and limited professional experience are welcome to submit applications.

Application forms and additional information is available at:

Visit this page to meet those who sacrificed themselves in the effort to overthrow Hosni Mubarak.

Local elected officials in southern and western Ethiopia are bitterly opposing the selling away of farm land by the Woyanne ruling junta to foreign investors, reports Ethiopian Review. Some of the local officials who take a stand are receiving threats and being summarily dismissed by Meles Zenawi’s puppets who are installed as regional administrators.

As it now stands, the United States appears content to contemplate exchanging Hosni Mubarak for Egypt's new Vice President, Omar Suleiman, the Egyptian spy master - that is, one dictator for another - to maintain the status quo. But as this article from Mother Jones points out, Suleiman 'looks to be a nasty piece of work'.

A Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (Comesa) team is in Uganda to observe this week’s elections. The team is led by Mr Simbi Mubako from Zimbabwe. The mission follows an invitation from the Ugandan Government. Comesa has in the past deployed similar observer missions to Rwanda, Burundi, DRC, Malawi, Zambia and Zimbabwe. The regional bloc said in a press statement that the observation of Uganda’s polls is meant to contribute to transparency of the process.

South Africa has expressed sharp concern over concerted attempts by leading industrialised countries, particularly the US and the European Union (EU), to extract onerous commitments from developing countries as a condition to concluding the stalled Doha Round trade negotiations. 'We are deeply concerned over attempts to raise the level of ambition by leading industrialised countries in industrial goods and services that would call for a substantial payment from developing countries,' South Africa’s trade and industry minister Dr Rob Davies told IPS.

'NGOs don't mobilise people, desperation mobilises people,' said a Cambodian land activist as he related the experience of Boeung Kak villagers who were driven off their land by their own government to make way for corporate profiteering. Such stories were abundant from all corners of the world this week at the World Social Forum in Dakar, Senegal. The forum, which celebrated its 10th anniversary this year, attracted representatives from civil society organisations, social movements and unions from more than 123 countries. Present among them were land rights activists and small farmers, who came to relate and decry the unfettered grabbing of their land.

A new Eurodad report provides a critical analysis of the World Bank’s role in Climate Finance. Civil society actors have long been contesting the role of the World Bank as an appropriate channel for climate finance based on the Bank’s questionable green credentials and its history of advising economic policy reforms to developing countries. The report concludes by outlining the reasons why – in light of the analysis of the Bank’s delivery of climate finance as it relates to the financing instruments - the World Bank is not the best-placed institution to channel climate finance or to set the highest standards for a legitimate and development-friendly climate finance architecture for the future.

Media in Southern Africa still has a long way to go towards gender sensitive reporting in newsrooms, a study by Gender Links has revealed. Most Southern African media houses in 14 countries had very few reports on gender based violence from mid October to mid November in 2009 in a study carried out during that period. A media progress study and gender in media education audit workshop by Gender Links in Gaborone also revealed that Botswana remained in the lower ranks of most categories of the study.

This training will have three main components: a high level brainstorming session that will bring together leaders from Eastern Africa, China, India and Europe; a scholars’ discussion and critique session; and a delegates’ workshop on the theme: Is Eastern Africa Ready for China, India and Europe?

The newest issue of KANERE is available online. The Kakuma News Reflector, or KANERE, is an independent news magazine produced by Ethiopian, Congolese, Ugandan, Rwandan, Somali, Sudanese and Kenyan journalists operating in Kakuma Refugee Camp, Kenya.

Zimbabwe's Finance Minister Tendai Biti is likely to boycott a forthcoming trip to China to tie up a controversial $3-billion platinum deal which has provoked a political storm. Government insiders and diplomatic officials say relations between Harare and Beijing could become strained if Biti snubs the talks. China is anxious to secure huge platinum deposits in Zimbabwe worth about $40-billion for a market price of $3-billion. This has angered Harare officials, who think the Chinese want to swindle the country.

More than 3,000 people have been displaced from settlements in Somaliland's eastern region of Toghdeer following a five-hour-long battle on 7 February between the Somaliland National Army and clans loyal to the Sool, Sanag and Cayn (SSC) militia group. A long-standing dispute exists over the territories of Cayn, Sool and Sanag, with both the self-declared republic of Somailiand, in northwestern Somalia, and the self-declared autonomous region of Puntland in the northeast claiming them.

'President Hosni Mubarak has decided to step down as president,' Vice- president Omar Suleiman announced Friday night on state television. In Cairo’s Tahrir Square, the epicentre of the popular uprising that began on 25 January, some two million protesters let out a cathartic roar heard for miles across the sprawling capital. A 30-second announcement had ended 30 years of repressive authoritarian rule. But while Mubarak is out, his regime remains deeply entrenched. There are still vast networks of corrupt public servants, monopolists, party loyalists and abusive police in place.

Land grabbing in Mozambique by transnational corporations, that hire rural workers who are not able to access lands to produce, is one of the issues that concern peasants of that country the most. Real World Radio interviewed Jose Mateus, leader of the National Farmers Union of Mozambique, member of La Via Campesina, who is participating in activities at the World Social Forum in Dakar, Senegal. Mateus regretted that many peasants of his country end up working for big agribusiness transnational corporations, because they don’t have the support of the State to access lands.