How is it possible that a woman living in a water-rich region only needs to open the tap to get enough water for herself and her family, while a woman in a water-scarce region has to walk for miles and miles to get far less water of much worse quality? This article has two parts. The first deals with dominant positions concerning water: the neoliberal agenda, consequences of water privatisation, and the UN stance. The second part looks at what is missing in this picture and ignored by the dominant perspectives - namely, global inequalities and gender discrimination.

Human Rights Watch has called on Saudi Arabia to stop the deportation of Somali refugees back to the war-torn Horn of Africa nation, reports Bloomberg. Saudi authorities sent more than 150 people back to the Somalia capital, Mogadishu, on 17 December, HRW said, citing local press reports. Another 2,000 were returned in June and July, according to the United Nations.

A leading academic has ripped into the country's education system saying it is failing South Africa's youth. Speaking at the graduation ceremony for the Eastern Cape Student Sponsorship Programme at Selborne College in East London, Rhodes University vice-chancellor Dr Saleem Badat called the state of education in the country a 'tragedy'. 'It is an absolute scandal that the South African school system functions the way it does in 2010, 16 years after the start of democracy in our country,' Badat said.

A very important patent decision may have just been made in Mumbai. Abbott Laboratories, one of the world's biggest research-based drug companies, doesn't like it - they are now considering what to do. But HIV/Aids campaigners are celebrating. The Mumbai patent office has rejected Abbott's application for a patent in India on its drug Kaletra - a combination of the two antiretroviral medicines lopinavir and ritonavir. The decision could help enable the manufacture of cheap versions of a key Aids drug, reports the London Guardian.

In the first commentary piece of this month's newsletter Ms Sanusha Naidu comments on South Africa’s recent inclusion into the BRIC grouping. The second commentary by Alexandre de Freitas Barbosa looks at relations between Brazil and Africa (article in Portuguese) followed by a review by Prof Deborah Brautigam of a recently released report on China’s possible influence and activities in African media. The January edition is available .

The marathon task of counting the ballot in southern Sudan's independence referendum was underway on Sunday after the week-long polling on partitioning Africa's largest nation closed. 'Secession. Secession. Secession', the returning officer intoned on Saturday night as he carefully unfolded each ballot paper cast at a polling station in a school in the southern capital of Juba before pronouncing the voter's choice.

A jobless man who set himself on fire in a northeast Algerian town bordering strife-torn Tunisia to protest the mayor's refusal to meet him over jobs and housing died of his injuries on Sunday, his family said. It was the one of four attempted public suicides in Algeria this past week in apparent copycat replays of last month's self-immolation of a 26-year-old graduate in Tunisia which triggered a popular revolt that led to the ouster of that country's ruler Zine El Abidine Ben Ali.

Tunisia is trying to restore order following the 'Jasmine Revolution' that led former president Zine El Abidine Ben Ali to leave the country on Friday. Until new presidential elections are held within the next two months, Chamber of Deputies Speaker Foued Mebazza will be Tunisia's president. Ben Ali is now in Jeddah, the Saudi Royal Palace confirmed Saturday.

Luleki Sizwe, a small, all-volunteer group that campaigns for LGBT people, is based in Cape Town’s mostly poor black townships and rural areas. The organisation works with and supports women who have been victims of what has fast become a ubiquitous form of targeted sexual violence in South Africa: 'corrective rape' against gay women or women suspected of being gay, as a form of 'curing' them. A campaign of the organisation has garnered 130,000 signatures worldwide.

The lives of Botswana’s transgender people are seemingly about to change for the better, following the registration of Rainbow Identity Association (RIA), a trans and intersex oriented organisation, formed in 2007 after founder, Skipper Mogapi, realised marginalisation of these gender identities among the general lesbian, gay and bisexual movement in that country.

Two South African groups have launched a move to get an arrest warrant issued against Tzipi Livni, the chairperson of Israel's Kadima party, during a visit to the country next week, Israeli media have said. Haaretz.com, quoting Channel 10, said the Media Review Network (MRN) and the Palestine Solidarity Alliance (PSA) allege Livni committed war crimes in her role in Israel's three-week war on Gaza in late 2008-2009. Livni was then foreign minister in the government of Ehud Olmert.

Traditional funding sources for NGOs are drying up and grants are being reduced due to various factors, says this article on Externally, the fact that South Africa is viewed as a middle income economy has resulted in decreased funding opportunities. It has also been noted that the inadequate expenditure of funds by the South African government has contributed to the decrease in donor funding. The recent economic recession has seen some funding organisations in the United States merging to survive, just like their United Kingdom counterparts. Some have indicated that they intend to focus on programmes that are replicable regionally, say, in a number of countries within the Southern Africa Developing Countries (SADC).

Soldiers patrolling on the periphery of the BeitBridge border fence have been accused of sexually harassing desperate border jumpers intending to cross to South Africa. Zimbabweans living in South Africa who had come to the country hoping to acquire travel documents have been forced to leave the country without passports due to chaos at the Home Affairs Department. Sources who spoke to Radio VOP said women who use undesignated entry points into South Africa are subjected to sexual harassment including rape.

The Ethiopian government has unveiled an HIV policy for its transport sector, which has grown significantly in recent years alongside the rapidly expanding road network. 'Various national studies have shown that those working across the transport sector - especially drivers and their assistants - are vulnerable to HIV infection as they spend considerable time away from their families,' said Ethiopia's transport authority director Kassahun Hailemariam.

Cameroonian gay rights activist Alice Nkomo has come in for sharp criticism over a European Union grant meant to provide health training for sexual minorities in the conservative country. News of the euro 300,000 grant which was finalised last week has heightened already widespread sentiment against lesbians, gays, bisexuals and transgenders in the west African country. Anti-gay movements in the country have urged the government to take the EU to task for providing the funds to Ms Nkomo’s organisation.

A new study from the American Journal of Public Health reports that mining is a significant determinant of countrywide variation in tuberculosis among sub-Saharan African nations. The study's authors conclude, 'Our findings suggest that mining profoundly affects not only the health of miners but also the dynamics of TB incidence in sub-Saharan African nations...As shown by the population risk of mining, improved public health and health care conditions for miners may be necessary not only for the miners themselves, but for controlling TB more generally among sub-Saharan African populations.'

In this week's edition of the Emerging Powers News Round-Up, read a comprehensive list of news stories and opinion pieces related to China, India and other emerging powers.

Ng?g? wa Thiong'o, one of the greatest writers, thinkers and philosophers of our time will be the keynote speaker on: Saturday, 22 January 2011, Waterfront Hotel at Jack London Square, 10 Washington St., Oakland.

This position provides the opportunity to support existing advocacy coalitions and campaigns on women's human rights in a stimulating, multicultural and dynamic environment.

Pambazuka Press is pleased to announce the release of its new titles for 2011, available at www.pambazukapress.org.