Twenty-three Namibian refugees who arrived in Botswana in 1998 were voluntarily repatriated to Namibia early Saturday (18 November 2006) morning at the Dukwi Refugee camp. The Namibians mostly from the Caprivi region and the surrounding areas sought political asylum in Botswana in 1998 after an unpleasant political situation in the region.

In a somewhat surprising move, the Nigerian government asked poultry farmers and veterinary doctors to desist from vaccinating poultry against the avian influenza better known as "bird flu". Nigeria's poultry industry has over 140 million domestic birds and the sector contributes 9 percent to the country's Gross Domestic Product.

In different prisons around the country, the government of Equatorial Guinea in October 2006 is still holding at least 63 political prisoners, according to human rights groups. Many of these have been subjected to heavy torture and most have not been through a fair trial.

The African National Congress (ANC) wheeled out some of its heavyweights during debate on the controversial Civil Union Bill and also offered an olive branch to the Christian and traditional lobbies by promising a review of the Marriage Act next year. Defence Minister Mosiuoa Lekota and Deputy Justice Minister Johnny de Lange joined Home Affairs Minister Nosiviwe Mapisa-Nqakula in urging the National Assembly to approve the bill.

Human trafficking, including women forced to become prostitutes or minors forced to do child labor, is worse now than the trade in African slaves of past centuries, a top Vatican official said Tuesday (14 November 2006).

A year after establishing a specialised unit to combat domestic violence and child abuse, Swaziland is claiming to have reduced crimes against children by a third. At the launch of the first annual report by the Royal Swaziland Police Force's Domestic Violence and Child Protection Unit, Leckinah Magagula, head of the unit, told IRIN: "Last year, we recorded three abuse offences committed against children every day.

The Mozambican Human Rights League (LDH) has called for an urgent "integrated and multi-sector methodology" to eradicate or diminish the problems affecting the country's prisons. LDH lawyer Nadja Gomes warned on Wednesday that the way in which the justice sector operates, and particularly the prisons, has led society to distrust the administration of justice.

In 2003, Corporal James Omedio and Private Abdullah Muhammad stood before a public firing squad for killing Irish Catholic priest Declan O'Toole, his driver Patrick Longoli, and his cook Fidel Longole. They were executed after they were found guilty by a field court martial, following a trial that lasted two hours and 36 minutes.

Businesses which need foreign language-speakers for call centres are reluctant to employ foreigners because of the work permit process. A number of South African firms refuse to employ skilled foreigners because of nightmarish immigration bureaucracy, say recruiting agents and immigration experts.

A law that will enter into force on November 12 mandating that states clear their territory of explosive remnants of war will help reduce civilian casualties following conflict, but states should go further and agree to a treaty on cluster munitions, Human Rights Watch said today.

Reporters Without Borders has condemned the imposition of prior censorship on the print media and a ban on sensitive issues on private radio stations under a state of emergency in the capital, N'Djamena, and six of the country's regions, which the government decreed on 14 November 2006 in response to the serious intercommunal violence of the past few weeks.

As Cote d’Ivoire’s political leaders struggle with the conflict that has divided their country for the past four years, Ivorians at the grass-roots level have managed to resolve festering, deadly battles over land rights. Authorities this year completed a pilot programme to record rights to land after lengthy consultations with villagers, elders, chiefs and local officials.

Chadian human rights groups say what began as cattle raiding has become "a veritable armed conflict" in southeastern Chad as inter-communal clashes escalate, imperiling efforts by aid agencies to help the wounded and displaced. Meanwhile, the United Nations refugee agency (UNHCR) on Tuesday (14 November 2006) confirmed that the recent violence, which started on 4 November, had left more than 220 people dead and appeared to mirror that of the unrest in the neighbouring Darfur region of Sudan.

All sides must stop fighting immediately in Darfur, the top United Nations peacekeeping official said today (14 November 2006), as he outlined increasing diplomatic efforts over the next few weeks aimed at ending the spiralling violence and the "very tragic" situation in the strife-torn region.

This report, based on interviews conducted with refugees from mixed Eritrean-Ethiopian families in Egypt, seeks to explain the uniquely difficult situation still faced by this group. It contends that because of their family relations with both Eritrea and Ethiopia, people from mixed families find themselves in limbo legally, socially and psychologically, and should therefore be of concern to UNHCR's international protection regime.

Two refugees are dead and more than 78,000 people have been uprooted by flooding that engulfed refugee camps in eastern Kenya over recent days as rising waters destroyed hundreds of homes in the mainly Somali camps near Dadaab.

The heavy rainfall that has continued to pound Coast Province has caused extensive flooding, displacing more than 50,000 people in Kwale District and leaving a trail of destruction on roads. There are fears that some 200,000 people could be affected if the rains do not subside.

The Executive Director of WFP, James Morris, has called on the international community not to forget the plight of the Sahrawi refugees in Algeria, tens of thousands of whom are still entirely dependent on external assistance to survive, some three decades after fleeing a territorial dispute.

United Nations and Sudanese officials have arrived in Uganda in an effort to persuade tens of thousands of reluctant Sudanese refugees to return to their homes in the south of Africa's largest country. The UN refugee body, UNHCR, began the repatriation programme early this year but then stopped the exercise on October 20 after gunmen killed dozens of people in a series of attacks on highways in southern Sudan.

William Swing, the UN Special Representative for the Secretary General in the DRC, met Archbishop Monsengwo, the president of the National Episcopal Conference of Congo (CENCO), on Thursday November 9, 2006.