The number of Somalis forced from their homes in Mogadishu has now topped 96,000 since the start of fighting between government forces and armed opposition groups on May 8. Out of this latest total of displaced, an estimated 35,000 are still in the city, looking for shelter in more secure areas because they have no means to leave.

The Kenyan government should rapidly fulfill its February 2009 pledge to provide more land for its mushrooming Somali refugee population, and donors should step up their financial support for the refugee camps, Human Rights Watch has said. The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) announced four months ago that Prime Minister Raila Odinga of Kenya had made a commitment to provide land to help relieve congestion in three chronically overcrowded camps near Dadaab in northeastern Kenya. But the Kenyan government has yet to make any land available.

Heavy fighting has erupted in central Somalia between a pro-government Sufi Muslim group and Islamist hardliners. At least 10 people have been killed in fighting near the town of Webho. The clashes come after the Sufi Ahlu Sunna Waljamea sect pledged to defend President Sheik Sharif Sheik Ahmed at a meeting of moderate Islamic leaders.

There has been another delay in the Wiwa v. Shell trial, causing teeth-gnashing by journalists who have dedicated resources to cover the trial, hand-wringing by Ogoni people and human rights & environmental justice supporters worldwide, and head-scratching by nearly everyone else following along.

The official signing ceremony of the Mauritania peace pact, brokered by African Union Facilitator and Senegalese President Abdoulaye Wade, was postponed from Wednesday to Thursday to give time for the Facilitator to witness the signing, official sources told PANA.

The Kenya Human Rights Commission has now documented 40 cases of castration, severe sexual abuses and unlawful detention, which were carried out by officers of the British Government. The actual number of Kenyans who suffered this barbaric treatment at the hands of British officers in fact runs into their thousands. In recent years, following exhaustive research by historians, it has become clear that far from being the acts of a few rogue soldiers, the torture and inhuman and degrading treatment of Kenyans during the Emergency Period (1950s to early 1960s) resulted from policies which were sanctioned at the highest levels of Government in London.

The Dadaab refugee camp in Kenya, home to 270,000 Somali refugees, is the world's largest. Created 18 years ago as a stopgap, new fighting is driving thousands of additional refugees into the already overcrowded, overstretched camp.

The Spring 2009 issue of the Peace and Conflict Review reflects the growing dialogue between theorists and practitioners, addressing philosophical issues of methodology and socio-political analysis as well as practical ways for protecting human rights and facilitating sustainable and equitable development.

As Ken Saro-Wiwa stood before the hangman’s noose in Port Harcourt, Nigeria’s oil capital, he spoke not just of his imminent death but also of the campaign against Royal Dutch Shell that had won him international attention. Sentenced to death after a deeply flawed trial, he had come to be seen as a martyr by those opposing alleged abuses involving the oil industry in his country. According to fellow activists, his last words before his execution were: “Lord, take my soul but the struggle continues.”

The Central African Republic (CAR) has been in the throes of a humanitarian crisis for more than a decade. Army mutinies, coups and attempted coups, rebellions, gangs that kidnap for ransom and, more recently, elements of Uganda’s notorious Lord’s Resistance Army have made life for civilians, especially in the north, extremely challenging, unpredictable, and very dangerous. As IRIN’s new documentary film, Under the Gun, demonstrates, many Central Africans have little say over where they live even.

"Air cargo companies involved in illicit or destabilizing arms transfers to African conflict zones have also been repeatedly contracted to deliver humanitarian aid and support peacekeeping operations, according to a report released by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI). This AfricaFocus Bulletin contains excerpts from a press release, the executive summary of the report, and chapter 3, with data related to past conflicts in Angola, Liberia, and Sierra Leone, and to continuing conflicts in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Somalia, and Sudan.

It is in Egypt's interest to show more respect for human rights, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said on Thursday, hitting a raw nerve in U.S.-Egypt relations ahead of a visit by President Barack Obama. Clinton met representatives of Egyptian pro-democracy groups at the State Department one day after she received Egypt's foreign minister.

The country’s security chiefs have taken the current political fight over the reappointment of Gideon Gono a step further, threatening to take up arms to prevent the removal of the Reserve Bank Governor from his post. Robert Mugabe on Monday declared that Gono, his money-man for many years, will retain his job despite the political deadlock that has been created with the MDC over Gono’s position.

The number of Somalis fleeing the latest escalation of fighting in and around Mogadishu has surpassed 67,000, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) reported today, adding that worsening security has also hampered aid delivery to the capital. Intense fighting between the Government and the opposition Al-Shabaab and Hisb-ul-Islam groups erupted in several north-west areas of Mogadishu on 8 May.

Sub-Saharan Africa will receive around $10 billion from the IMF in Special Drawing Rights (SDRs) to help its economies weather the global financial crisis, the Fund's chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn said on Monday. As part of a $1.1 trillion deal to combat the world economic downturn agreed at April's G20 summit, the IMF will issue $250 billion worth of SDRs, which can be used to boost foreign currency reserves.

The Nigeria Red Cross says conflict-hit areas it has been able to access in the Niger Delta are in better condition than anticipated, but that continued restrictions on aid workers' movement leaves many questions unanswered. Government soldiers are controlling access in and out of the Delta, site of a military incursion launched on 13 May to crack down on Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND) militants.

The IDMC has released a new profile of the situations of internal displacement in Sudan. As a result of Sudan’s numerous conflicts, about 4.9 million people remain internally displaced in the country; together they make up the single largest internally displaced population in the world.

President Yoweri Museveni of Uganda should ensure that the recommendations of the Uganda Human Rights Commission are carried out and that independent commissioners are appointed promptly to the new Equal Opportunities Commission, the Human Rights Network-Uganda, the Foundation for Human Rights Initiative and Human Rights Watch said in a letter to Museveni.

Witnesses have testified in the case of 11 men in Burundi, accused of the attempted murder of albino people and selling of their body parts. Initial charges of murder have been dropped because the prosecution failed to produce enough evidence. Police suspect the body parts are being sold in neighbouring Tanzania, for use in witchcraft.

Sudan's army says it has taken control of a town near its border with Chad, recently seized by rebels. Sudan says more than 60 people were killed during the fighting with the rebel Justice and Equality Movement around the town of Kornoi, in Darfur. The news comes as African leaders meet for talks, partly on regional conflict.