They are huddled together in a group in the midst of an animated discussion to which each has something to contribute. Eager to make her point is Barbara Kyomugisha. At just 24 years old, Barbara is a single mother living with HIV. The contribution she makes towards this discussion is first hand. To her, the affordability of health services is just as important as accessibility in addressing the rates of maternal mortality in Africa.

Amnesty International is calling on the Gambian government to end its widespread use of arbitrary detentions and torture as activists worldwide stage protests against the authorities' appalling human rights record on 22 July, the country's national holiday known as "Freedom Day".

Constitutional outreach members from all the ten provinces, with drivers and technicians included, are threatening to down their tools due to poor working conditions and a breach of agreements by COPAC. Barely a month after the launch of the Constitutional Outreach, aimed at coming up with a new constitution under the auspices of the Constitutional Parliamentary Committee, threats of its cessation are growing everyday as problems mount.

In one of the biggest advances in HIV prevention in decades, a vaginal gel containing an antiretroviral drug has been proven to protect almost four out of 10 women from HIV. A study of almost 900 HIV negative women from KwaZulu-Natal found that there was a 39% lower HIV incidence rate in the group that used the gel containing tenofovir. This ARV-containing gel (known as a microbicide) could save over 800,000 lives and prevent 1.3 million new HIV infections over the next two decades in South Africa alone, according to statistician Brian Williams.

The January 2011 referendum in Southern Sudan will mark a turning point for the region and could see the formation of Africa's newest state, but how will the south fare after the vote? A report commissioned by the non-profit organization Pact Sudan and conducted by the London School of Economics in several of Southern Sudan's states (Eastern Equatoria, Greater Bahr el-Ghazal and Upper Nile), highlights issues that pose a threat to peace and security in Southern Sudan.

Over 25,000 cases of measles and 121 deaths have been recorded since the outbreak of the highly-contagious disease was reported in Malawi in February. Director of Preventive Health Services, Dr. Storn Kabuluzi, said the disease was still spreading but government was doing all it could to contain it.

On 21 July, when ruling on a case where 21 victims of torture at Nyayo House had approached the High Court for justice, Lady Justice Hannah Okwengu found the State agents culpable of having violated human rights and fundamental freedoms with impunity. While the victims filed the case way back in 2004, it was a vindication that even if the wheels of justice grind slowly, they still deliver justice and reparations to those afflicted by human rights abuses. The Judgment is a citadel for the defence of human rights in Kenya in many ways.

Resurgent violence on the outskirts of Nigeria's central city of Jos has left seven persons dead and 10 others injured, the official News Agency of Nigeria reported. The report said several houses were also burnt in the attack on the sleepy and mountainous ville of Maza, in the Jos Nioorth council area.

A big effort is under way to circumcise 80% of young men in Zimbabwe after a study four years ago found that the operation reduced the chance of contracting HIV by 60%. Yet the procedure is still not widely available across sub-Saharan Africa, where HIV prevalence is high, the International Aids Conference in Vienna was told.

San bushmen in Botswana have lost a court case to allow them to re-open a vital waterhole in the centre of the Kalahari desert. Diamonds were found in the Central Kalahari Game Reserve, traditional home to the bushmen, in the 1980s - and the government asked them to leave.

"I'm a woman with a disability. I am HIV-positive and I am on ARVs (antiretroviral drugs). My life is very hard." These were the first words Immaculate, a 52-year-old landmine survivor in northern Uganda, said to me when I met her in May. "It took long for me to declare my status. I felt I should just die," she said. Margaret is another Ugandan with HIV who also has an amputated leg from a landmine accident.

When Omar, an 18 year-old Moroccan college student, fell in love with his classmate Salma, he felt nervous about broaching the use of condoms with her. It was his first time having sexual relations and he feared that she might question his fidelity. “I was afraid she would be angry if I suggested we use a condom,” he said. “I was afraid of losing her – so afraid that I thought of giving up the whole idea of using a condom.”

The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) and some 37 journalists' unions and association are pressing government leaders attending the 15th African Union Summit in Kampala, Uganda, to make safety of African journalists a priority for the African Union. In a letter to AU leaders the unions, led by the IFJ African regional body the Federation of African Journalists, welcomed the declaration by African leaders to designate 2010 as the "Year of Peace and Security in Africa".

South Africa's parliament is considering an information bill the government says will better protect secrets but critics fear could hamper access to market-sensitive data and muzzle media investigations. The Protection of Information Bill sets guidelines for classifying state information as well as creating a legislative framework for the government to combat espionage and other hostile activities.

A New England Journal of Medicine study has revealed that early initiation of antiretroviral treatment could reduce death rates and the Tuberculosis incidence.

Algeria has adopted a law which will allow private firms for the first time to lease state-owned farmland but it also imposed restrictions on foreign investment. Gulf investors have shown an interest in Algerian farmland, part of a global trend for countries with large cash reserves to try to secure food supplies by targeting farmland abroad.

Participants at the on-going Fifth African Agriculture Science week, which entered its third day on Wednesday, want all the stakeholders including political leaders to develop func tional policies that will encourage more intra-Africa trade. The participants, who include civil society groups from within and outside Afric a involved in agriculture, farmers group and non-governmental organizations, said existing protocol on free movement of goods and persons, particularly in ECOWAS countries and other Regional Economic Communities (REC), needed to be fully implemented.

Kenya’s Constitutional Court is due to set a date on Jul 22 for a hearing on the application against the Anti-Counterfeit Act of 2008, of which clauses pertaining to medicines have been suspended pending the court’s decision on whether the law violates the right to health and life.

Nigeria's Senate has voted to move up general elections to January, pressuring President Goodluck Jonathan's ruling party to resolve a split between the mainly Christian south and majority Muslim north. The House of Representatives must still approve the new election rules after the Senate decided on Wednesday to change the constitution to allow for a January vote in the world's eighth-largest oil exporter. Senators voted through a proposal to hold the general election "not earlier than 150 days and not later than 120 days before the expiration of term of office," of either the president or a state governor.

The International Criminal Court must probe alleged crimes against humanity after Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe’s youth militia launched a campaign of rape during 2008 elections, a campaign group says. Witness statements by rape victims, vetted by a team of international lawyers, suggest the ruling ZANU-PF unleashed “sexual terror” against women who supported the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), it said.