A deadly animal virus which broke out earlier this year in Tanzania could spread to Southern Africa, threatening the lives of more than 50 million sheep and goats in 15 countries, the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) has warned. Known as Peste des Petits Ruminants, or small ruminants’ plague (PPR), it is considered the most destructive viral disease affecting small flocks, on par with rinderpest, a deadly cattle plague that has wreaked havoc on agriculture for millennia, resulting in famine and economic destruction.

Nigeria still aims to pass a bill this year that will overhaul its energy industry, but the timing of its next oil licensing round is uncertain, a senior government official said on Thursday. The Petroleum Industry Bill will re-write Nigeria's decades-old relationship with its foreign oil partners, altering everything from the fiscal framework for offshore oil projects to the involvement of indigenous firms in the sector.

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Sudan policemen and Darfur rebel militias clashed in Sudan's western region of Darfur, government and rebels said. It was reported that both sides are claiming a crushing victory. The Sudan government said its forces had killed many rebel fighters while rebels from the Justice and Equality Movement (Jem) claimed to have killed about 50 policemen. The interior ministry said the fighting begun when Jem rebels ambushed a government fuel and food supplies convoy in southern Darfur.

Fears that antiretroviral therapy might lead healthier-feeling HIV-positive people to have more sex and potentially infect others may be unfounded, according to a new South African study, which recorded patients having significantly less sex as well as safer sex after starting treatment. The study followed 2,332 HIV-positive patients enrolled in care who eventually started treatment at a large urban clinic in Soweto, Johannesburg's largest township, and a rural clinic in Mpumalanga province between 2003 and 2009.

The Liberian president has dismissed her cabinet in a move officials say will provide a 'fresh slate' for the government. No other reason was given for Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf's announcement on Wednesday but it comes amid a crackdown on corruption in the West African state that has led to investigations of some public officials a year ahead of presidential elections.

The Asian University for Women is seeking to appoint candidates to the following positions:
- Full-time faculty position in Asian Religion and Philosophy
- Chinese Language Instructor
- Full-time faculty position in World History
- Full-time faculty member in Media/Journalism.

Developed by Jidaw Systems Limited, a ICT training, consulting and web content provision firm in Nigeria, the Nigeria Computers blog is a public online resource for Information and Communications Technology for Development (ICT4D) in Nigeria. With an aim to promote ICT4D in Nigeria, the blog will provide information, insights and opportunities to network. The blog’s focus on ICT4D content is geared towards ICT for job creation, business development, entrepreneurship, youth empowerment and poverty alleviation.

A three-year project to increase forest cover and help local communities in eastern Uganda adapt to climate change has been launched. 'The planting of one million trees has started to sustain an area of tropical forest in Africa the size of Wales,' said John Griffiths, counsel-general of the Welsh Assembly, which is supporting the project. 'These trees will not only absorb carbon but provide shade for crops.'

An explosion rocked a government guest house in Nigeria's oil-producing Niger Delta on Wednesday, a month after twin car bombings in the capital Abuja, a local government official said. The explosion damaged two upstairs rooms of the guest house in Asaba, the capital of Delta state, but there were no injuries, Sunny Ogefere, spokesman for the state governor said.

The government's contentious draft Protection of Information Bill will threaten whistleblowers trying to root out corruption, says Cosatu general secretary Zwelinzima Vavi. 'Cosatu is committed to free expression... I believe that the Protection of Information Bill as currently drafted clearly breaches these laws,' he told a gathering hosted by The Daily Maverick in Sandton, Johannesburg.

You would expect to find children in the Vaal River outside Parys on a hot afternoon. But 28 of them, on the Gauteng side of the river, are not swimming; they are doing research for ORASECOM. For three months beginning in November, ORASECOM, the Orange-Senqu River Commission, will test the water quality, the environmental impact of industry and the general health of the ecosystem at some 60 sites along the river basin. The data is to be shared amongst all four of the participating states and the goal is to get some idea on the impact of water use along the system.

Researchers have attempted to link foreign aid to conflict with some suggesting that aid exacerbates existing ethnic cleavages while others say it presents an opportunity to payoff rebels who start civil war. Yet others argue that aid decreases the risk of civil war by promoting economic growth and strengthening state capabilities. This study delves into the confusion over foreign aid and its effects on armed conflict. It argues that aid shocks or sudden decreases in aid revenues, may shift the domestic balance of power and potentially induce violence because potential rebels gain bargaining strength with the government.

Entries for the UNEP Young Environmental Journalist Award Africa are now open. The competition, which is made possible through funding support from the Government of the United States of America, is open to African journalists between 25 and 35 years old, working for African news and media organisations.

A judge has temporarily ordered a tabloid in Uganda to stop publishing lists identifying people it claims are gay after an advocacy organisation filed a lawsuit. The order came a day after Rolling Stone - which has no relation to the iconic US music magazine - published a list of people it said were gay, urging readers to report them to police. Last month the tabloid published names, photos and address of 100 people that it called the country’s top gays and lesbians, alongside a yellow banner reading, 'hang them'.

Since the workers from Vale, Brazil’s giant mining company, started to drink at his bar, fortune has favoured Mario Sálimo. With business growing week by week, the 47-year-old has opened extra rooms, added a restaurant and installed a dance floor. At weekends Mario’s Bar, near the clogged and dusty centre of Tete, is open until five or six o’clock in the morning. And the bar is not the only thing booming in this remote Mozambican town, which grew up as a trading post on the Zambezi river. Tete sits directly above one of the world’s largest reserves of high-quality coal.

The Harvard Africa Policy Journal is the leading scholarly journal in the United States dedicated to African policy. A call for papers has been issued for this year's theme, 'From the Heart of Africa'.

UNICEF Executive Director Anthony Lake joined the Kenya Government and other partners on Friday to roll out an innovative approach to prevent the transmission of HIV from mothers to their babies (PMTCT). The initiative includes a combination of interventions and supplies such as a 'Mother-Baby-Pack' of antiretroviral drugs and antibiotics, which women can easily administer at home. Without treatment, around half of all children born with HIV will die before their second birthday.

Morocco exercises secret detention and ill-treatment of detainees under counter-terrorism laws, Human Rights Watch (HRW) alleged in a provocative new report titled 'Stop looking for your son: Illegal detentions under the counterterrorism law in Morocco'. 'While Morocco has demonstrated the political will to adopt enlightened human rights legislation, it lacks the political will to enforce it when it comes to terrorism suspects,' said Leah Whitson, head of HRW's Middle East and North Africa division.

A parliamentary select committee has begun compiling comments on a new constitution, gathered at 4,000 meetings held across Zimbabwe over the past three months. Gender activists are confident that women's views have been expressed; it will be up to the eventual drafters of the new constitution to ensure they are reflected. Over 700,000 people attended public meetings on Zimbabwe's draft constitution.