George Bush is using the World Trade Organisation to force-feed you genetically modified food. To force genetically modified (GM) products into global markets, George Bush has filed a legal dispute at the WTO, accusing the European Union of blocking trade by restricting GMOs. You can make a difference: sign the Citizens' Objection, demanding that your right to say no to GM food is not undermined.

Riot police turned an urban township into a ghost town Wednesday, rounding up the last residents in defiance of a UN call to halt a demolition campaign that has left 700,000 without homes or jobs. After emptying the Porta Farm township - where some 30,000 people lived just days ago - earth-movers were seen lumbering into the area to finish clearing debris from destroyed homes, cabins and shacks as part of what the government calls Operation Drive Out Trash.

* EDITORIAL: Kepta Ombati and Ndung’u Wainaina unravel Kenya’s contradictions to explain what’s behind the current constitutional crisis
* COMMENT AND ANALYSIS: Africa’s wound has festered for too long. Charles Abugre says it’s time for the bleeding to stop
- Issa Shivji has the final say on Live 8, urging people to understand the history of poverty
- Rafael Marques introduces us to a truck driver, a diamond digger and train-track market in Angola
- There’s a big dam project coming to a town near you. Muramuzi Frank and F.C. Oweyegha-Afunaduula explain what’s wrong with the Bujagali Dam development in Uganda
* LETTERS: Subscribers on drumbeats over Africa, post-colonial boundaries, refugee day and the papacy in Africa
* BLOGGING AFRICA: Sokari Ekine introduces Pambazuka News to the African blogosphere
* BOOKS AND ARTS: A review of ‘Empowering Children: Children's Rights Education as a Pathway to Citizenship’
* CONFLICT AND EMERGENCIES: Background to Niger famine; uncertain peace in Sudan; ICC trials in Uganda
* HUMAN RIGHTS: Sharm el-Sheikh human rights blast fears; human rights concerns in Togo elections
* REFUGEES AND FORCED MIGRATION: Durable solutions for Rwanda’s displaced; access to justice for UK asylum seekers
* WOMEN AND GENDER: Structural adjustment, women and HIV/AIDS
* ELECTIONS AND GOVERNANCE: Constitutional referendum for Kenya; toilet democracy in Zimbabwe
* DEVELOPMENT: Drilling up a debt; religion and development aid; the costs of free trade
* CORRUPTION: Leader looters exposed
* HEALTH AND HIV/AIDS: Community solutions for Aids orphans in Southern Africa
* ENVIRONMENT: Chinese takeaway in forestry sector
AND…internet, advocacy, resources, courses and jobs.

Protocol on the Rights of Women in Africa Update:

Cape Verde this week became the 12th African country to ratify the Protocol on the Rights of Women in Africa, an African Union instrument that will offer significant protection for women’s rights once it comes into force. Three more ratifications are now needed before the protocol comes into force. The countries that have ratified are: The Comoros, Djibouti, Libya, Lesotho, Mali, Namibia, Nigeria, Rwanda, Senegal, South Africa, Malawi and Cape Verde.

Messages received by SMS in support of the protocol:

‘Great news! Thanks 4 the hard work sisters’ – South Africa

‘Thank you for your message and it is a good thing for Malawi and all Africa’ - Zambia

‘Great News. We should continue our fight for more ratifications’. – DRC

Visit to find out about SMSing for social justice.

How does Mr. Caplan expect Israel to recognize thegenocide of the Armenians and Rawandans when it barely recognizes the genocide of theRoma Gypsies suffered simultaneously with the Jewsduring the Nazi era? While Mr. Caplan brought outsome very excellent points during his address to the Toronto Armenian Community,it was a grave oversight on his part to have completely omitted the Roma Gypsy genocide whose numbers may have totalled anywhere from 800,000 to 1.5 million. They too were targeted for who they wereand not for anything they did yet there has been hardly any recognition given to them for the past sixty years.

According to the Genocide Convention, deliberately inflicting conditions of life upon any group calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in partfalls into the category of genocide.This canbe associated withthe collective and brutal treatment of the Palestinian population as an entire group who are targeted for who they are and not for anything they have done while Israel continuously uses its security defense as a justification for destruction.

While it is always difficult to believe that anyone can descend to such barbaric depths, it is even harder to comprehend how many people support this, or simply turn away with complete indifference.It is also appalling to think that those who suffered such atrocities in the past which originated from sheer racism could be inflicting the same on others by applying racist laws and policies targeted at a specific group.

Children have petitioned Parliament to legislate a policy that would make Universal Primary Education (UPE) completely free. They also petitioned the government to provide free uniforms, mid-day meals and scholastic materials. They presented their two petitions to the Speaker of Parliament, Mr Edward Sekandi and State Minister for Children Affairs Felix Okot Ogongo at the launch of Uganda Parliamentary Forum for Children on Friday.

EDITORIAL:
- Helping Africa shouldn’t be so much about making poverty history, as making the looting of Africa by rich countries history, argues Firoze Manji
- Operation Murambatsvina - sweep out the trash – has torn through Zimbabwe like a Tsunami and Zimbabweans are feeling like the rest of the world is ignoring their plight, says Mary Ndlovu
COMMENT AND ANALYSIS:
- Issa Shivji is not optimistic that the G8 summit will produce significant changes for the millions of people trapped in poverty
- Bob Geldof is only the latest in a long line of Europeans who have appointed themselves as spokespersons for Africans, writes Patricia Daley
- Social movements and civil society activists will be meeting in Mali for their own G8 counter summit. Barry Amanita Toure explains why
- George Dor critiques the recent debt cancellation “deal” for Africa, the Blair Commission for Africa and the rise of Paul Wolfowitz to the top job at the World Bank
- Raised Voices is a unique project that traveled the world to gather views of the majority world on the G8
- Expect sugar-coated statements and hot air from G8 leaders, says Thomas Deve, who discusses various mobilizations to injustice including the World Social Forum and Global Call to Action Against Poverty.
- The best service the world could give Africa, argues Makeda Tsegaya, would be to support struggles to transform leadership on the continent
- Marie Shaba, chairperson of the Tanzanian Association of NGOs, discusses how the G8 can assist Africa’s development
PAN-AFRICAN POSTCARD: Tajudeen Abdul-Raheem on why Live 8 and G8 attention for Africa “is like being offered a handkerchief by the same person who is beating the hell out of you.”
GLOBAL CALL TO ACTION AGAINST POVERTY: African voices on the G8 via SMS; news from mobilizations in Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania and Mozambique
PLUS: Links to news on conflict, human rights, elections, development, refugees, women’s rights, media, environment, jobs and books…

"We, associations of inhabitants, international networks, voluntary groups, NGOs, public agencies, citizens of the world, are profoundly hurt by and denounce the ‘Murambatsvina operation’ (sweep away the garbage operation) launched by the government of Zimbabwe."

Zambian President Levy Mwanawasa has made his anti-corruption campaign the hallmark of his administration, hoping to persuade voters to give him a second term in next year's elections. Now it may well secure his ousting. The campaign has won Mwanawasa powerful enemies within the circle of former President Frederick Chiluba, the man the anti-graft efforts have largely targeted, while some senior figures in his own administration are unsure of whether they may be next in line for investigation.

Visit http://www.standupforafrica.org.uk/ to sign a petition to make poverty history in Africa.

The United Nations housing agency is co-sponsoring a major awareness campaign to clean up Lake Victoria as rapidly growing urbanization along its shores threaten the world's second largest body of fresh water with increasing pollution and environmental degradation from waste and industrial effluents. "The main objective of the project is to innovatively change attitudes and behaviour with regard to environmentally unsound activities that continue to harm Lake Victoria," UN-HABITAT said in a statement.

"We the undersigned call on the Group of 8 (G8) leaders to recognize and act upon the twin, interlinked crises of debt and global warming. Current G8 energy investments are fundamentally at odds with sound development practice. Ongoing public financing of the fossil fuel industry is increasing debt, poverty, and climate change. Urgent action is now required to substantially reduce emissions, reduce fossil fuel dependence, and protect people around the world, especially the vulnerable, the poor and disappearing nations."

Children are often forced to work due to chronic poverty. Globally, work is the main occupation of almost 20 percent of all children aged under 15. This is considered a major obstacle to achieving the Millennium Development Goal (MDG) of universal primary education by 2015. Research from the University of Oxford in the UK suggests that child labour is often essential to household survival. Children who do household work release adults from domestic responsibilities to earn a wage; those employed outside the home contribute to family income.

A website has been launched by a group of Nigerians, to deter former military dictator, General Ibrahim Babangida from making a come-back. The website, www.againstbabangida.com, has as one of its main features a listing of Nigerians tagged "Public Enemies," for promoting or working for the aspiration of Babangida to rule Nigeria again, come year 2007.

Click on the link below for updates from GCAP campaign partners in South Africa, Mozambique, Kenya, Sierra Leone and Senegal.

800 school children, 20 Kenyan celebrities and GCAP campaigners launched the African snaps and SMS campaign in Moi Avenue Primary School in downtown Nairobi. Wearing white bands, girls and boys listened to Kora award winner Achieng Abura, Kisima award winner Abbi speak about the importance of the fight against poverty and the Day of the African child.

Achieng declared at the press conference, "We do care about poverty. We are concerned about the growing gap between the rich and the poor in Kenya and very happy to be associated with the Global Call to Action against Poverty campaign." Abbi said, "We are a small representation of numerous African artists that link their music, poetry and theatre to social issues such as HIV/AIDS, poverty and children". They were among prominant musicians, sportspeople, actresses and film-makers. The event was very well attended by the international and Kenyan press. Millions of Kenyans will see the advert as it goes on national television over the next few weeks leading upto the AU and G8 Summits in July. A leading television station, the Kenyan Television Network has offered free air time to the campaign.

William Kassina of Moi Avenue Primary School recited a powerful poem that called on the African adult to stop conflict, end poverty and violence against girls. He said, "although the African child goes barehanded and barefooted, I shall not mourn. We must bring this to an end". The boys and girls were treated to acrobatics, songs and speeches by the artists in front of two three-feet mobile-phones held by mannequins walking on six feet high stilts. The launch took place alongside other GCAP Kenya events in Kiandutu, Thika and Homa Bay that also celebrated the Day of the African Child.

In Africa, the Global Call for Action against Poverty (GCAP) meeting in Nairobi at the end of March 2005 developed a calendar of events for the regions to include:

May 28 The Africa Day
June 16 The Day of the African Child

To be added to:
July 1(2) The 1st White Band Day
September The 2nd White Band Day
December The 3rd White Band Day

In preparation for the sub-regional coordinators and partners in GCAP embarked the following:
i) Mobilising the National and sub-regional Coalitions in each of their regions
ii) Developing a list of activities for each of the events
iii) Developing media strategies to catalyze awareness building as well for lobbying and publicity
iv) Developing specific asks/demands or messages for each of the key areas or goals
v) Fund raising.

An estimated 246 million children are engaged in child labour. Ensuring access to quality basic education is critical to eliminate the worst forms child labour. Governments have an obligation to provide compulsory and quality elementary education for each child. Join Vernor Muñoz Villalobos, United Nations Special Rapporteur on the Right to Education, and Human Rights Education Associates staff for a chat about child labour and the right to education on the occasion of the World Day Against Child Labour 2005.

Reporters sans frontières (RSF) has voiced "revulsion" at a government-orchestrated campaign to smear murdered journalist Deyda Hydara following the release of a report by the National Intelligence Agency (NIA) on its ongoing investigation into his death. The report is full of gratuitous detail about the journalist's private life and absurd theories about the motives for the murder.

In support of the call from the recently held South African AIDS Conference for a united action to spur a new spirit of unity in fighting the pandemic, the International Federation of the Red Cross and Red Crescent is launching a new advocacy campaign "Our Children – Our Future" for orphans and other children made vulnerable by HIV and Aids (OVC) on Wednesday 15th June 2005 at The Indaba Hotel, Fourways, Johannesburg, South Africa from 10:00-12:00. The campaign will be rolled out in ten southern Africa countries wherein volunteers from Red Cross National Societies are already active in supporting people living with HIV and Aids (PLWHA) and caring for children orphaned and made vulnerable by the disease.

A global campaign against the water transnational Suez has now been lauched in many countries around the world! For more information on the Suez campaign go to www.stopsuez.org.