Examining the linkages between pastoralism and conflict using a sustainable livelihoods-based conflict analysis, this paper looks at the challenges posed by conflict in pastoral regions. In particular it focuses on the challenges to development as well as the risk conflict presents to domestic and international security. A new generation of emerging pastoral projects share many common characteristics. They: acknowledge pastoralists as capable environmental custodians and managers; allow for patterns of mobility and livelihood diversification; include the systematic participation of pastoral communities; enhance access to and options for extended information and communication; improve representation of pastoral interests vis-à-vis external agents (other land users, government bodies, market agents, civil society, etc.); stress the development of pastoral markets.

President Robert Mugabe's human rights record has been condemned for the first time by African leaders, significantly increasing pressure on the Zimbabwean leader to restore the rule of law and stop evicting people from their homes. The unprecedented criticism comes from the African Union's Commission on Human and Peoples' Rights, meeting in Banjul, The Gambia, which had until now been silent about the growing evidence of human rights abuses in Zimbabwe, according to the Mail and Guardian.

The Coalition on Violence against Women (COVAW) engages chiefs and other local leaders to become women’s rights advocates and resources for victims. The program was formed because of the lack of women’s rights advocates for women who have been subjected to violence. Women who have been abused usually turn either to local hospitals/clinics or to their chiefs. However, none of these groups were able to adequately meet the women’s needs and the Coalition on Violence Against Women wanted to change this. Visit the website of New Tactics in Human Rights to find out more.

Negotiations between the warring parties of Sudan's Darfur region over power-sharing arrangements are deadlocked, impeding the search for an overall peace deal to end three years of bloodshed, negotiators said on Wednesday. Two Darfur rebel movements and the Sudanese government are deep into a seventh round of peace talks in the Nigerian capital but they have had to put aside two critical power-sharing issues after weeks of detailed talks failed to achieve progress.
Related Link:
Women Boost Darfur Talks
http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=31537

An enormous humanitarian crisis is emerging in the Democratic Republic of Congo’s Katanga Province, with tens of thousands of people being displaced, but so far the government and the international community are doing little. "Katanga is not on the political map, which is why such a massive humanitarian crisis can go ignored," said Jason Stearns, the International Crisis Group's senior analyst on Central Africa, who is working on a report on Katanga to be released in early 2006.

Malawian President Bingu wa Muthrika's main rival, the United Democratic Front (UDF), has said it is willing to take up his offer to break the political impasse in the country provided he works on improving relations with parliament. In his New Year's eve address last week, Mutharika said he was ready to talk to the opposition provided "they withdraw the impeachment charges against me", which followed the president's anti-corruption campaign that netted former ruling party members.

A group of Ethiopian opposition leaders, aid workers and journalists - facing treason, conspiracy and genocide charges have been denied bail. The High Court judge said the severity of the accusations against the group of 131 precluded their release. The group, including all the leaders of the main opposition Coalition for Unity and Democracy (CUD) party, are refusing to recognise the court's legitimacy.

Security forces in Nigeria have killed 12 men they say were stealing oil from a pipeline in the southern Niger Delta. Officials said that a gun battle broke out when troops on patrol came across a group using heavy drilling equipment to siphon oil from a pipeline. Three others in the group, in the remote Oghara community, were wounded and five were arrested. Correspondents say oil theft is a common practice in one of Africa's biggest oil-producing countries.

Ethiopia and Eritrea's dangerous stalemate over their disputed border, could force the United Nations to withdraw its peacekeeping mission, UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan has said. "As a result of the restrictions imposed on UNMEE [the UN's Mission in Ethiopia and Eritrea], the present position of the Mission is becoming increasingly untenable," Annan said in a report to the UN Security Council on Tuesday. "The time may be fast approaching to take difficult decisions on the future of the Mission."
Related Link:
Latest report from Crisis Group on border dispute
http://www.crisisgroup.org/home/index.cfm?id=3850&l=1

Rival political leaders from Somalia are reported to have reached an agreement to reunify the country after 15 years of factional division. The talks, taking place in Yemen, have been led by Somalia's president and the parliamentary speaker, allied to armed militias controlling the capital. Officials say President Abdullahi Yusuf has agreed in principle to move the central government to Mogadishu.

To campaigners in Kenya, the New Year starts with a feeling of dissatisfaction at how the government of President Mwai Kibaki has ignored its own anti-corruption campaign. Human rights and anti-corruption groups have accused the government of paying only lip service to the war on corruption. They say Kibaki's government, elected on a platform of zero tolerance on corruption, has nothing to show for - three years after coming to power.

When the 1,700-strong U.N. peacekeeping force was withdrawn from Sierra Leone on Dec. 31, the United Nations hailed the mission as one of its major political success stories in a continent ravaged by war and ethnic conflicts. "The (UN) mission was able to overcome a number of serious political and military challenges to become an effective peacekeeping operation that leaves Sierra Leone much better off today than it was five years ago," UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan boasted last week.

The paper deals first with the taken- for- granted definition of African "corruption". The orthodoxy that a trans-cultural position on "corruption" has legal and moral validity, and can be captured in a measurable way, is rejected. The exploration of "corruption's" meaning is followed by a synoptic examination of the significant evidence pointing to Western management failure with respect to African "corruption". Despite comprehensive searches, not one objective study could be found that demonstrates any "positive" Western impact on African "corruption". Yet this assault on Africa "corruption" could be the next neo-colonial chapter.

Minister of Home Affairs and Internal Security, Anna Kachikho has threatened to act against corrupt immigration officers who provide Malawian passports and other travel documents to foreigners. The minister sounded the warning in an interview with The Daily Times on complaints that some officers at Immigration were conniving with foreigners. “As Home Affairs Minister, I will not condone any officer who receives bribes from foreigners to assist them with Malawian travel documents.

Egypt will deport 654 Sudanese refugees who were violently evicted from a protest camp in a Cairo park last week (December 31), a Foreign Ministry spokeswoman said Tuesday (January 3). They will be taken to Sudan by ship on Thursday (January 5) because "they were either found to be illegal immigrants or refugees who had violated security conditions," spokeswoman Fatma el-Zahraa Etman told The Associated Press.

The International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) is deeply concerned about the charges held against 129 persons including 2 minors, opposition activists, human rights defenders and journalists. Since May 15, 2005 and the Ethiopian parliamentary elections, repression has come down in Ethiopia. In June and November 2005, two waves of repression of the elections protests led to the death of almost 100 people including unarmed protesters, students and children. Thousands of people have been arrested.

PEACE X PEACE is an international organization which empowers women worldwide to “enrich lives locally and promote peace globally”. It connects women’s groups (called “Circles”) in the United States with women’s Circles around the world in a Global Network. Via the Internet, the “Sister Circles” exchange information and personal experiences. It is the largest organization in the world that uses the Internet to support women of different cultures through communication. Communicating through PEACE X PEACE provides women with the opportunity to change perceptions, create friendships, and work towards collaborative goals, with the ultimate aim of creating lasting peace. A monthly e-newsletter uses exclusive essays, opinion pieces, interviews, and stories from peace experts around the world to tell you about peace building in the world.

This book, from the University of KwaZulu-Natal in South Africa and edited by South African activists, provides more detail on the practical threats to public well-being and climatic stability arising from the growing fashion for carbon trading. It focuses in particular on the disturbing record of South African "carbon-saving" projects and their role in shoring up a destructive oil economy with a record of harm to African people.

The International Court of Justice, the UN’s highest judicial body, recently delivered what may perhaps emerge as its most memorable ruling. Titled "Armed Activities in the Territory of Congo," the ruling found Uganda liable of violating Congo’s territorial integrity while in the course of a five-year spate of unlawful military intervention on Congo’s territory between 1998 and 2003.

Reports indicate that Uganda has begun negotiating payment terms with the Democratic Republic of Congo after the International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruled that Kampala should compensate the neighbouring country for invading and plundering her neighbour's resources. Congo sued Uganda in the UN's highest court in 1999.The two countries have an option of negotiating between themselves to reach a compromise amount and terms of payment.