South Africa, as a member of the G20 group, is playing an increasingly important role in world affairs, but the xenophobic riots of May 2008 offered a reminder of how explosive the social situation can be. Khulile Nkushubana, general secretary of CONSAWU (1), examines the recent developments in the fight against racism and outlines the strategies for a more harmonious future.

Clashes in central Somalia and the capital have killed at least 46 people, officials and peace groups have said, while a newly-appointed security minister pledged to build strong national security forces. Meanwhile, the African Union (AU) said it was investigating a mystery illness that had killed three Burundian peacekeepers based in Somalia. Eighteen more were in a Kenyan hospital with the same symptoms, an AU official said.

Thousands of Congolese have been uprooted by the latest escalation of fighting in the South Kivu province of the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). Our initial estimates show that at least 35,000 people have been displaced in the Ruzizi River plain where the DRC borders neighbouring Rwanda and Burundi. These people have reportedly fled in the wake of the latest government military campaign code-named Kimia II, which began on 12 July in the Uvira territory of South Kivu.

A little over 18 years ago, when the ruling Ethiopian Peoples Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) came to power, people were so eager to exercise democracy that even children started to challenge their parents saying "this is my democratic right". Perhaps it was too good to last. Earlier this month a new anti-terror law was passed, granting sweeping powers to the state to detain people it deems threatening. It follows closely on the heels of legislation that severely restricted the operations of NGOs working human rights issues.

The Ugandan government should urgently charge or release five detainees held by military intelligence, one of them for 16 months, Human Rights Watch has said. Lawyers for the detainees' families and friends filed petitions for habeas corpus with the High Court in Kampala on July 17, 2009 seeking to compel the government to justify the legal basis for continuing detention.

The Plateau State Judicial Commission of Inquiry in Nigeria should investigate and call for the prosecution of members of the security forces responsible for the alleged killing of more than 130 people in November 2008, Human Rights Watch has said.

Karim borrowed money to expand his bakery. When the money ran out, and facing the prospect of imprisonment if unable to repay his debts, the 36-year- old Egyptian baker sold his kidney. His case, among hundreds documented by the Coalition for Organ-Failure Solutions (COFS), a Washington-based NGO working to end organ trafficking, reveals an alarming trend: poverty is driving Egyptians to sell their organs.

The Kenya Human Rights Commission (KHRC) would like to comment on the ongoing debate about prosecution of perpetrators and financiers responsible for the post-election violence versus the role of the Truth, Justice and Reconciliation Commission (TJRC) in handling the question of justice. To begin with, KHRC wishes to remind Kenyans that the post-election violence as result of the disputed presidential elections in December 2007 led to massive deaths, displacement, injuries and destruction of property.

Police in Khartoum began a crackdown on Ethiopian and Eritrean refugees in the past few days. The Amharic service's Tizita Belachew interviewed leaders of the refugee community in Khartoum on Thursday and Friday who said the raids began on July 5 and each day since then truckloads of police and other Sudanese government security have raided the homes and business of Eritrean and Ethiopian refugees, confiscating the contents of their restaurants and homes and beating and raping women and children.

This latest report from the International Crisis Group examines the root cause of the country’s many crises, namely the reluctance of the long-ruling National Congress Party (NCP) to enact policies that would bring justice to the victims of its many conflicts. To end Sudan’s centralised, exploitive and unaccountable governance, the NCP must accept judicial reforms and transitional justice mechanisms as key elements of a Darfur settlement and at the same time fulfil its side of the 2005 Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA), which halted decades of civil war.

Poor food security in Akobo, the main town in Southern Sudan's Jonglei state, is being exacerbated by a huge influx of displaced people, including 19,000 who fled attacks by cattle rustlers. “The gap analysis that we have done shows that the needs are greatest among the recent IDPs,” David Tolu Lemiso, health project manager at the NGO Nile Hope Development Foundation (NHDF), said. “Out of 3,442 households from Nyandit, 2,050 are still badly in need of help, and that is minus those from Wanding, Kuechar and Ogal payams [sub-divisions].”

Amid mounting international opposition to a proposed referendum for President Mamadou Tandja to stay in power, the European Commission – one of Niger's largest donors – has warned of aid cuts if leaders do not respect constitutional order. “Any changes to the constitution, notably its fundamental articles, should not be made in the absence of consensual and inclusive dialogue,” European Commissioner for development and humanitarian aid, Louis Michel, said in a public statement.

The Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) is continuing to kill and kidnap civilians in northeastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), according to the UN. In the first fortnight of July alone, the Ugandan rebel group carried out 33 attacks in the districts of Upper and Lower Uele, killing 26 civilians and abducting 144, according to a report by the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA).

This report seeks to provide an overview of existing social protection policy and programming initiatives in the West and Central Africa and to assess the extent to which these address the particular manifestations of childhood poverty and vulnerability that characterise different countries in the region. It highlights challenges in the design and implementation of child-sensitive social protection and offers a number of policy recommendations based on the analysis and lessons learned.

Rwanda's post-conflict recovery has a number of impressive signposts. One is the economy, which grew at an annual rate of about 11 percent last year, according to the country's national bank. Another is the political empowerment of its women. In 2008, Rwanda elected the world's first majority-female parliament and today a woman leads the country's Supreme Court. One third of the cabinet of President Paul Kagame is female.

Poor rains have heightened food insecurity in Kenya's northwestern region of Turkana, where malnutrition rates in children under five have risen above the emergency threshold, according to humanitarian officials."Poor rains in April, May and June worsened food insecurity in the region, where 74 percent of the population [estimated at 550,000] already depends on food aid," Vincent Kahi, the health coordinator for the International Rescue Committee (IRC), said on 15 July at a press briefing in Nairobi.

The government of the Democratic Republic of Congo should urgently investigate and prosecute senior army officials allegedly involved or complicit in rampant sexual crimes against women and girls, as part of its efforts to combat sexual violence, Human Rights Watch has said in a report. Human Rights Watch also called for a series of other actions to prevent sexual violence during conflict in Congo.

Rival parties from north and south Sudan have agreed new plans to prevent conflict ahead of next week's ruling on their disputed border. The two sides ended 22 years of conflict in 2005 but tension remains high, especially in the oil-rich region of Abyei, claimed by both sides. A court in The Hague is due to rule on the border next Thursday and both sides have promised to abide by its ruling.

Botswana has refused to admit into the country a group of 41 refugees who were spirited away from a refugee camp in Namibia last week end by a local human rights organization over ‘security fears’. The refugees, including women and children who were driven to the Botswana border by Namibia’s National Society for Human Rights (NSHR, are still stranded at the border.

The image this week of the former Liberian president Charles Taylor, defiant in a black suit and dark sunglasses, taking the stand in a courtroom in The Hague – the first time an African head of state has been prosecuted for mass crimes – resonates powerfully. For many, the trial represents another victory for international justice and another signal of the end to impunity for the likes of Taylor, Slobodan Milosevic, Saddam Hussein and Alberto Fujimori – presidents who murdered, raped and tortured civilians before eventually finding themselves in the dock. In Africa, however, the Taylor trial elicits mixed – and more complex – reactions.