Rwanda's Supreme Court dismissed on Tuesday a petition against the election of incumbent President Paul Kagame filed by his main opponent in the recently concluded election, Faustin Twagiramungu. "The petition is not backed by any evidence to support the accusations. We therefore dismiss this petition," Justice Louis Marie Mugyenzi, of the Supreme Court, ruled.

Amnesty International has recently launched a public appeal for Kenya to ratify the Rome Statute. The action includes a model letter to send to key government authorities.

The Eastern Cape NGO Coalition (ECNGOC), the Eastern Cape Provincial Council of Churches (ECPCC) and the Border Rural Committee (BRC) want government to open the lodgement phase of the land restitution process for those who were dispossessed through forced "betterment" removals. Betterment was implemented in the former homelands and other so-called black areas from the 1930's onward - to regulate these areas and control land usage. Areas were divided into distinct land use and people were forced to move into the demarcated residential zones. People were also dispossessed of arable and grazing land. Between 1.3 and 2.5 million people were dispossessed through betterment - more than any other category of forced removal.

An appeal in the case of Amina Lawal, who was sentenced to death by stoning by a Sharia court in Katsina State in Nigeria, was heard on August 27 and postponed to September 25. The World Organisation Against Torture (OMCT) is urging those concerned to write to the Nigerian authorities urging them to: Guarantee the physical and psychological integrity of Ms. Amina Lawal and her family; Take all necessary measures to secure respect for the rule of law in Nigeria which includes respect for the prohibition on torture and cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment and punishment, such as the practice of corporal punishment; Guarantee women their human rights, including their right to be free from discrimination and their right to be free from torture and inhuman and degrading treatment or punishment; Ensure in all circumstances the full respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms in accordance with national and international standards.

A measles vaccination campaign in Zambia has been hailed as a "spectacular success" by the UN Children's Fund Representative, Dr Stella Goings.

Child labour, especially in plantation estates in the Rift Valley, is hampering the government's effort in sustaining the free primary education. The practice, which is rampant in the tea and sisal estates, led to the withdrawal of pupils from a number of schools so as to provide cheap labour.

More than half of all children in sub-Saharan Africa never get to finish basic school, and 120 million adults across the region cannot read, write or add up a column of numbers. At the current rate of progress, Africa will not get every child into school until 2100. This is a travesty of human rights and a tragedy of human capital. Unless it is urgently addressed, neither economic take-off nor democratic consolidation will be possible and NEPAD's objective will not be achieved within the next two decades. The African Networks Campaign for Education for All (ANCEFA), that aims to build civil society capacity for its full participation in education issues and advocate, in one voice, for Education for All and other National Coalitions in Africa, urge the African Union to take concrete measures to end the African education crisis.

A national child labour survey conducted by the Ghana Statistical Service (GSS) has revealed that over 28 per cent of children of school going age are out of school with most of them working. It further showed that about 1,273,294 children are engaged in child labour throughout the country.

The socio-economic system underpinning apartheid in South Africa was based on the exploitation of black workers in the mines, the factories, the fields and the shops. It is widely recognized that the struggles of the South African black working class contributed decisively to the overthrow of the racist regime. In recognition of the power of organised labour, the democratic government elected in 1994 granted South Africa's unions unprecedented legal and constitutional rights. However, despite these gains, the country's labour movement has been facing a fresh set of challenges, from macroeconomic policy to the factory floor, many of them emanating from labour's political allies in Government. The purpose of this book is to examine how the South African labour movement is responding to these challenges in the new millennium.

Transitional government officials designated by the two principal former rebel movements in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) took their oath of office on Thursday in the capital, Kinshasa, after a modification was made in the pledge of allegiance. Fourteen ministers and eight vice-ministers from the two groups - the Rassemblement congolais pour la democratie (RCD-Goma) and the Mouvement de liberation du Congo (MLC) - had refused to take the oath of office on Friday because it required a pledge of allegiance to President Joseph Kabila, but not to the institutions and laws of the country.

On World Day for International Justice, 17 July, Amnesty International (AI) launched a universal ratification campaign aimed at lobbying for as many ratifications of the Rome Statute as possible in the next 10 years. As part of this campaign, each month AI will issue a public web action calling on states that have not yet ratified to do so. The action includes a model letter to send to key government authorities.

E-vote, or E-mail-voting is a non-profit private initiative. It tries to use the power of the internet to influence political decision making, bringing political leaders and voters closer together and giving the majority a voice. E-vote is a service and has no political viewpoint of its own. Participants get an easy to use medium to express their political demands.

In withdrawing the United States from the International Criminal Court and in its current efforts to undermine the court's authority, the Bush administration has fallen far short of the high standards of justice that the United States has set for itself and by extension the rest of the world, says this commentary. The United States has also launched a campaign to persuade states supporting the court to sign agreements not to surrender U.S. nationals to it.

CREDO and FAHAMU would like to thank everyone that has supported or signed up for the African Union Press Freedom and Freedom of Expression Campaign. The campaign petition with signatories as of July 7th was submitted to the African Union in Maputo at the African Union 2nd annual summit on the 9th of July. The campaign petition is still open till the end of September 2003. The updated list of signatories will be submitted to the newly elected Chairperson of the Commission of the African Union H.E. Mr. Alpha Oumar Konare who replaces the interim Chair H.E. Amara Essy. The new African Commission Chairperson resumes office in September. The petition can be signed at the petition site by clicking on http://www.ipetitions.com/campaigns/freeafricanmedia/  or by sending: Name, Name of organisation, Position or Title, (if applicable) Country and comments if any - to [email][email protected] . Also help by circulating the information to other persons or organisations. If you would you like to do more, please make this message part of your signature and/or forward it to like-minded people.

The humanitarian crisis continues in eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo. While the recent formation of an interim government and arrival of a multinational protection force in the province of Ituri have brought a new level of security and opportunity to the country, they have not ended fighting among rival militia groups or prevented violence against civilians and human rights violations in the eastern territories. The undersigned in the letter available by clicking on the link provided call on their governments to support, each to the limit of its capacity, an expanded and strengthened effort in the DRC, that matches the extent of the emergency.

Malawi's presidential and parliamentary general elections in 2004 promise to be ugly and brutal. Last week in Blantyre, the militant “Young Democrats” - a wing of the ruling United Democratic Front (UDF) - brutally beat up a local newspaper journalist and robbed him of his two cameras and a cellular phone.

The Anti-Eviction Campaign, a group that campaigns against the forced removal of people from their homes, says it is “saddened and disturbed” by recent events, including a spate of arrests, to hit the community of Mandela Park in the Western Cape, which comprises thousands of old people who are all facing eviction.

Active participation of citizens in shaping policy and decision making of their countries is impossible if their own governments continue to deny them the rights necessary to ensure such participation. These include the rights to freedom of expression, assembly, association and political participation, as well as media freedom to facilitate a free exchange of information, ideas and opinion. This is part of the text of a press statement issued on Tuesday at the 2nd African Union meeting of Heads of State in Maputo, Mozambique by CREDO for Freedom of Expression of Associated Rights, FAHAMU, the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ), World Association of Newspapers (WAN) and Media Institute of Southern Africa (MISA). Signatories to the petition, which has already been delivered to key political leaders in Maputo, included African and international journalists/media and freedom of expression organisations; African and international civil society and human rights organisations; individual lawyers, journalists, intellectuals, academics and human rights campaigners. Visit the link for the full statement, the letter to African leaders and the full list of signatories. Below are links to some of the stories generated by the petition.
* WAN Appeals to African Union for Press Freedom
http://allafrica.com/stories/200307050003.html
* MISA supports petition to the African Union for Press Freedom
http://www.kubatana.net/html/archive/media/030702misa.asp?sector=MEDIA
* IFEX members support media petition
http://www.ifex.org/en/content/view/full/51876/?PHPSESSID=a629b18ed6710…
* Media Freedom Issues to Be Highlighted At AU Meeting
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=35267
* Petition to the AU Calling for Press Freedom and the Release of Journalists
http://allafrica.com/stories/200307080789.html
* Press Freedom Petition to Go to AU Leaders
http://allafrica.com/stories/200307080515.html
* Malawi president to face AU press petition
http://www.nationmalawi.com/articles.asp?articleID=5110

The ICT Stories objective is to capture the learning process that accompanies the introduction and implementation of ICTs in a project in exemplary stories. Based on a set of criteria three winning stories will be selected by a renowned jury. The writers of these stories will be given the opportunity to travel to Switzerland to present their findings at the ICT4D platform at the WSIS.

The International Secretariat of the World Organisation Against Torture (OMCT) says it has been informed about the torture of Jum'a Omer Alnur and death in detention of Mr. Awad Ibrahim Gamar in Sudan. The organisation wants those concerned to write to the Sudanese authorities asking them to guarantee the physical and psychological integrity of other prisoners and to guarantee the respect of human rights and the fundamental freedoms throughout the country in accordance with national laws and international human rights standards.