The advent of antiretroviral therapy has brought greatly reduced morbidity and mortality among people living with HIV disease. Unfortunately, it has also meant that we often focus on the clinical aspects of therapy and viral suppression to the exclusion of the enduring principles of palliative care: attention to the physical, emotional and spiritual distress of those patients and families affected by life-threatening disease.

Tens of thousands of people have been killed in Sudan's Darfur region. Over 200,000 have fled across the border to Chad. Millions more are homeless. Most are women and children, terrified while the fighting continues.

This article tackles the history of diamond mining in the context of the movie Blood Diamonds, taking issue with a CNN report and exposing the history of De Beers diamond company.

The European Union and Guinea signed a deal on Friday to turn the spigot on EU aid for the first time in four years, but transparency and economic issues still dog the country’s creaking post-socialist economy, and the aid will not dent the main concerns of powerful unions that called strikes twice this year.

The Graduate Research Conference in African Studies is an interdisciplinary conference intended for students at all levels of their graduate careers. The conference aims to provide a friendly and informal setting in which students can discuss their research.

While research on colonial architecture and space has found a broad academic interest during the past several decades, research on the architectural staging and spatial implications of the worldwide expansion of religion has found much less concern.

From 22 to 24 November 2007 the Belgian Association of Africanists organizes an international conference on “Borderlands and Frontiers in Africa”. This conference will take place in Leuven, Belgium. It welcomes contributions from scholars across the humanities and social sciences working in and on Africa, and it especially welcomes contributions by African scholars.

The next volume of New Black Orpheus is billed for publication in May 2007. It will be the second to be published in the newly revived authoritative journal on African Literature. The first Vol. 7 No. 1 which carries an interview with South African poet and activist Dennis Brutus, is in press, due to be released in January 2007. Vol. 7 No. 2 will focus on literary currents and other cultural developments in the East Africa sub-region as seen by creative writers, critics, scholars and culture analysts.

Indeed, any reflection on China and Africa is timely and it is encouraging that you are taking the lead. Two weeks ago, the President of the African Development Bank (ADB) was at my Institute at the invitation of the Dutch Government to talk about poverty reduction, governance and regional intergration vis á vis the ADB lens. In his speech, Mr Kaberuka mentioned that he was optimistic that Africa could leap out of its 'misery' and that the Africa-China relationship could accelerate this development. That comment raised some 'expected' response from the host (the Chief Economist at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs) who sharply remarked that she was of the view that 'China is a Wolf in Sheep’s skin'. So now you know it will be interesting to hear a comprehensive African voice on CHINA!

Regarding your articles on China and its role in Africa, all I have to say is: You've got to be joking! Are you people serious about human rights?

China seen as a positive force? I could analyze your articles, but I won’t waste my time as you people seem to have bought into the idea of using China as a model to replace the western one. Although I have been highly critical of the west's involvement for years in Africa, South America, and Asia, the governments of Asia are indeed following in their shoes in exploiting people.

I see no willingness to put people first in their dealings. Cast your eyes to Asia, to China and India's dealing in working in other countries. All eyes are on China now working in Africa, but they have a poor record in other Asian countries, especially Burma, a country sometimes referred to as the Africa of Asia, in which China sucks out everything it can get in short order.

China is just like the west, but possesses a frame of mind that the westerners had a hundred years ago, or even now - the same colonial mindset, especially in ethnocentrism on a massive scale. The Han Chinese, as well as the Japanese look down on people with dark skin, who are seen as beneath them. All I have seen in Asia is a complete disdain for foreigners, especially in East Asia, where there is a disdain for people from Southeast Asia.

I also have worked on the Burmese-Thai border with the human rights situation there. There is a war going on there, and the Chinese support the Burmese military junta by supplying them with all the weapons they need in exchange for resources such as gems, energy, timber, and others as do the Indians and the Thai, to annihilate the ethnic peoples there. There is massive displacement there, and the Chinese are the main suppliers of the weapons used by the Burmese military to kill, rape, maim, and torture people in the remote depths of the jungle.

The Koreans also supply weapons to the Burmese military junta as weapons are business, and they could care less about people's lives.

So wake up! South to South partnerships!! Stop living a damn fantasy land, it's all about the money.

Editors reply: "I could analyze your articles, but I won’t waste my time ...". Well, in which case we take it this is not an informed response. Perhaps if you did analyse the articles, the paper tiger you set up might be less easy to shoot at. Interesting that you say nothing of the US and British collusion with the Burmese junta ...

The Home Office is investigating allegations that a representative of Uganda's ruling party secured a job in the immigration service and blocked the asylum applications of political opponents. John Guma-Komwiswa, of Bermondsey, south-east London, has been suspended from his post of senior caseworker pending an internal corruption inquiry by a specialist unit which is collaborating with police.

Ever since the Berlin Conference of 1883, which Belgium's King Leopold II called "the sharing of Africa's cake," the West has assumed exclusive rights over sub-Saharan Africa. But, while centuries of struggle to end colonial rule and apartheid have not changed this much, now Western influence is being challenged by China, which likewise covets Africa's rich reserves of minerals and resources.

The government of Denmark and the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA) on Friday (15 December 2006) signed a cooperation agreement to enhancing bilateral relations in addressing Africa's development challenges. The two parties signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU), which involves a $ 800,000 aid agreement to help the economic commission's development endeavors in the continent.

African countries have been warned against a new possible form of colonization resulting from China's heavy investment thrusts into several parts of Africa. South African President, Thabo Mbeki who gave the warning, says Africa must guard against falling into a "colonial relationship" with China. His comments come as fast-growing China is continuing to increase its push for raw materials across Africa.

The African-New World Studies Program at Florida International University seeks a Pre-Doctoral Fellow for the Academic year 2007-2008. Applicants must be ABD (have finished their course work and be already engaged in the writing of their dissertation): they must be conducting or have conducted research on the African or/and African Diaspora.

The Center for the Study of Race, Politics and Culture at the University of Chicago invites applications for the 2007-2008 postdoctoral fellowship to begin September 24, 2007 and end June 30, 2008. Qualified candidates from all disciplines and all ranks who have their Ph.D. in hand are encouraged to apply.

The 8th annual Uncovering Connections: Cultural Endurance between Africa, the Americas and the Caribbean conference Will be held March 8-10, 2007 at Medgar Evers College, Brooklyn, NY. The foci of the conference include: The intergenerational transmission of African culture (i.e. the role of parenting in the survival of African culture or documenting the knowledge and practices of elders in Africa, the Caribbean and the Americas).

The United Nations marked International Migrant’s Day with fervent appeals for the vast majority of States who have not yet done so to adhere to the treaty that seeks to protect the rights of the estimated 195 million people around the world who have left their homelands in search of better lives. “Rising numbers of migrants are being exploited and abused by smugglers and traffickers,” Secretary-General Kofi Annan said in a message. “Others suffer discrimination, xenophobia or racism."

The World Social Forum (WSF) was created to provide an open platform to discuss strategies of resistance to the globalization model proposed at the annual World Economic Forum at Davos. Firmly committed to the belief that “Another World Is Possible” the WSF is an open space for discussing alternatives, exchanging experiences and strengthening alliances among civil society organizations, peoples and movements.

The International Council (IC) of the World Social Forum (WSF) decided in its meeting in Parma on 10-12 October 2006 that the next coordinated worldwide WSF event after the Nairobi WSF in January 2007 will take place in 2009. This was not simply a minor logistical decision. The periodicity of the WSF events had been loaded with various kinds of political tensions, and the incapacity of the IC to make a decision on it had become a serious threat to the continuity of the process.