Doctors Without Borders President Bernard Pecoul and Brazilian Health Minister Jose Serra yesterday signed a letter of intent stating that the not-for-profit group would work with Brazil to export the country's successful anti-AIDS model and its state-produced generic anti-AIDS drugs to other developing countries, Reuters/New York Times reports.

Rising death rates in South Africa due to HIV/AIDS have led to the creation of a makeshift funeral industry, Newsweek reports. Many "fly-by-night undertakers," who are unlicensed and operate out of storefronts, compete to make funeral arrangements and leave bodies to decompose while they search for the cheapest means of disposal, creating a health hazard and raising costs to the government.

Christian Solidarity International (CSI) on Thursday, 6 September, reported that one of its research teams, recently returned from the Afro-Arab borderlands of Sudan, had found systematic of human rights abuses, as a manifestation of racism, among a group of "97 female slaves above the age of 12 who were recently liberated from bondage."

This is a series of useful lesson resources on various topics related to modern-day slavery. The two-pagers on "Bonded Labour" and "Slavery from the past..." can be used by teachers as illustrative materials in civic education, history or other social science classrooms.

All states involved in the slave trade should acknowledge their role and issue a formal apology to victims and their descendants, say campaigners
marking an international day of slave trade remembrance.

Three weeks after the massive anti-globalization protests in Genoa and after two days of intense discussion on globalization and human rights, the UN Sub-Commission on the Promotion and Protection of Human Rights has adopted three resolutions calling into question the impact of key aspects of the lobalization process on human rights, and has demanded that bodies like the WTO take fuller account of human rights considerations.

THE United States risked appearing indifferent about racism if it were to boycott the upcoming United Nations conference on the subject, South Africa's director general of foreign affairs said on Sunday."If they don't come, people will read into it that they don't see the issues as important. It will send a signal to their own constituencies and the rest of the world," Sipho Pityana told the SAPA news agency.

The Federal High Court has ruled to block the personal and business accounts of a number of former government officials and private businessmen accused of corruption, local press reports said Wednesday.

Kenyan Minister for Trade and Industry Nicholas Biwott, an influential figure in the government of President Daniel arap Moi, has criticised the aid conditions imposed on Kenya as impractical, and suggested that they smack of double standards.

"It is sad that, with its announcement about the pledges to the AIDS fund, the G8 conference was able to seize the PR high ground," an editorial in the Philadelphia Inquirer states. The commentary piece calls the G8's pledge of $1.3 billion to the Global AIDS and Health Fund created by U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan "a comparative pittance."

As the G8 summit opens today in Genoa, Italy, leaders of the world's most industrialized nations are this evening expected to "formally unveil" the Global AIDS and Health Fund, intended to battle HIV/AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis in the developing world.

At the World Conference Against Racism, the People's Movement for Human Rights Education will be holding a one day workshop on Breaking Through the Vicious Cycle of Humiliation: Strategies for Racial Justice Through Human Rights Education. The tentative dates of the event are September 2nd or 3rd and it is a complimentary activity to the WCAR.

Even though the world is incomparably richer than ever before, ours is also a world of extraordinary deprivation and of staggering inequality, Nobel Prize winner Amartya Sen, Master of Trinity College, Cambridge, writes in the International Herald Tribune.

The 2001 summit in Genoa this week will be a crucial test of the ability of participating nations to group around a common agenda on global economic governance. As protesters on Genoa's streets will make clear, the fundamental challenge facing the G8/G7 leaders is to address mounting concerns about economic globalisation and the power of transnational corporations, argues Tom Barry.

In advance of a major international conference
on racism, Human Rights Watch today called for reparations to counter the most severe continuing effects of slavery, segregation, and other
extreme forms of racism.

The European Union announced yesterday that it will contribute 120 million euros (about $103.5 million) to the Global AIDS and Health Fund, Reuters reports. The contribution will be officially announced by European Commission President Romano Prodi at the G8 summit that begins tomorrow in Genoa, Italy.

All over the world, in groundbreaking ways and often at great personal risk, grassroots activists with passion, commitment, creativity and leadership are taking a stand for human rights and fighting for social justice in their communities. Forefront is an international network of human rights activists from 30 different countries who have been recognized by the Reebok Human Rights Award. Forefront seeks a Program Associate to join a small team and contribute to all aspects of the organization's development. The position is comprised of 30% of coordinating the organization's administrative tasks and 50% organizing a new initiative, the Human Rights Web Resource Center, and 20% assisting with other program work as necessary.

In a court ruling on Wednesday last week, which has gone largely unnoticed, the status of Zimbabwe’s land grabs was finally made clear – they are illegal and cannot proceed legally until the rule of law is re-established.

Let me begin my presentation with a very provocative quote from an Ugandan political economist: "Anybody with any degree of intellectual integrity would see that globalisation of Africa --- or the integration of Africa into the global economy from the days of slavery to the contemporary period of capital-led integration – has on balance of costs and benefits been a disaster for Africa, both in human terms and in terms of the damage to Afirca’s natural environment. There is scarcely anybody in Africa who would talk of the last 300 years, including the last 40 years since the first African country gained independence, in language flattering either to colonialism or to governments that have taken over power since political independence."

A South African land protest which raised fears of Zimbabwe-style chaos has been halted peacefully by bailiffs who tore down newly built shacks with crowbars. But with hundreds of families claiming to have been homeless in sub-zero temperatures, the African National Congress government faced new accusations that it was neglecting the poor.