The October edition of the Fahamu Refugee Legal Aid newsletter, a monthly electronic publication that provides news, reflection, and learning on the provision of refugee legal, is available. Visit to access the edition.

The latest issue includes:

- Country of Origin and legal news
- Deportation and third country removal news
- Announcements
- Reader response: Rwandans in Zambia subject the the Cessation Clause
- Open letter to ExCom: The threat of invoking the Cessation Clause in particular reference to Rwanda
- Petition presented to the Djibouti delegation attending the UN meeting in New York, concerning Eritreans detained in Djibouti
- Israel Defense Forces (IDF) human rights violations against asylum seekers on the Israeli-Egyptian border
- Afghan refugees in Pakistan
- European Court issues freedom of religion judgment
- Unlawful detention and refoulement of asylum seekers in South Africa
- China’s new exit-entry law
- Croatia to join EU, drawing attention to refugee treatment
- The Refugee Consortium of Kenya: code of conduct
- Zimbabwe’s resettlement rumours
- The right to asylum of unaccompanied minors in the European Union
- Sources of persecution seldom spoken about: witchcraft accusations and asylum
- Serbia: a worrying situation outside the centre for asylum seekers in Bogovada
- Hong Kong refugee NGO calls for ‘march for protection’ in response to zero percent recognition rate for torture survivors
- Deportations of failed Ugandan asylum seekers
- Announcing the European database of asylum law
- As Syria stalemate continues, UN Security Council ponders options for protection of refugees and civilians
- Analysis: Was Hungary the first EU country of arrival? Legal responsibility before human rights: a short story on Dublin
- Argentina introduces state-run refugee status determination (RSD) system.

The UK government is bracing itself for thousands of legal claims from people who were imprisoned and allegedly mistreated during the final days of the British empire after the high court in London ruled that three elderly Kenyans detained and tortured during the Mau Mau rebellion have the right to sue for damages. The court rejected claims that too much time had elapsed since the seven-year insurgency in the 1950s, and it was no longer possible to hold a fair trial.

Turkey is the newest country to intervene in Somalia and its involvement has produced some positive results. Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdo?an’s courageous visit to Mogadishu in August 2011 at the height of the famine and his decision to open an embassy gave fresh impetus to efforts to establish lasting peace, says this briefing from the International Crisis Group.

The one-year anniversary of 'Bloody Sunday' - when 25 died during clashes with the Egyptian army at a peaceful protest for Christian rights outside Cairo's state media headquarters - is a stark reminder that no one has been held responsible for the deaths of those killed, reports www. english.ahram.org.eg.

At least 35 people were killed on Monday when Nigerian soldiers opened fire after a bomb blast struck their convoy in the northeastern city of Maiduguri, nurses at the hospital that received the bodies said. The nurses in the Umaru Shehu hospital said 30 of the dead were in civilian clothes, while another five wore military uniforms.

As a large contingent of armed forces and armed militias surround Bani Walid in preparation for a possible assault, Amnesty International has called on the Libyan authorities to avoid unnecessary and excessive use of force in the city and to ensure that medical and other essential supplies are allowed into the city. On 25 September, Libya’s parliament, the General National Congress authorized the Ministries of Interior and Defence to use force if necessary to arrest suspects including those responsible for the alleged torture and killing of Omran Shaaban, credited with capturing Colonel Mu’ammar al-Gaddafi on 20 October 2011.

Since Bosco Ntaganda’s mutiny in April 2012 and the creation of the 23 March rebel movement (M23), violence has returned to the Kivus. This crisis shows that today’s problems are the same as yesterday’s because the 2008 framework for resolution of the conflict has yet to be put in place, says this briefing from the International Crisis Group. Instead of implementing the 23 March 2009 agreement between the government and the CNDP (National Council for the Defence of the People), the Congolese authorities pretended to integrate the CNDP into political institutions, while the rebel group pretended to integrate into the Congolese army.

Several shells have landed in the capital of Sudan's South Kordofan state, near the country's southern border, witnesses say. A UN worker said five shells landed in and around the town of Kadugli, leading aid workers to seek shelter with peacekeepers. Rebels have been fighting in South Kordofan since last year but the state capital has been largely peaceful.

Rwanda’s military intelligence department known as J2 has illegally held scores of civilians in military detention without charge or trial amid credible claims of torture, Amnesty International states in a new report. 'Rwanda: Shrouded in Secrecy: Illegal Detention and Torture by Military Intelligence' reveals unlawful detention, enforced disappearances, as well as allegations of torture by J2. The report details credible accounts of individuals being subjected to serious beatings, electric shocks and sensory deprivation to force confessions during interrogations.

Small teams of special operations forces arrived at American embassies throughout North Africa in the months before militants launched the fiery attack that killed the US ambassador in Libya. The soldiers' mission: Set up a network that could quickly strike a terrorist target or rescue a hostage. But the teams had yet to do much counterterrorism work in Libya, though the White House signed off a year ago on the plan to build the new military task force in the region and the advance teams had been there for six months, according to three US counterterror officials and a former intelligence official.

UNHCR Assistant High Commissioner for Protection Erika Feller has appealed for strengthened political will to help the world’s more than 42 million refugees, asylum-seekers, internally displaced and stateless people, amid a recent rise in new humanitarian emergencies in Africa and the Middle East. In a speech to the annual meeting of UNHCR’s governing Executive Committee (ExCom), Feller listed drawn-out displacement situations, insecure settings, difficulties in helping acutely vulnerable people, and funding shortages as the major current obstacles to quality protection. However, she also took aim at countries seeking to outsource their asylum responsibilities elsewhere.

Amid the tributes to Ethiopia’s recently departed prime minister was much twittering (and tweeting) about ‘stability’ and the ‘transition’, especially from Ethiopia’s foreign donors. There is considerable concern that without Meles Zenawi, the charismatic former rebel leader who ruled Ethiopia for 21 years until his death, the country may implode, infighting might engulf the ruling party or Ethiopia’s fragile economic growth might reverse. While these fears about the country’s stability are warranted, there has been little recognition of the role that human rights play in underpinning stability, says this Human Rights Watch post.

US President Barack Obama's administration is facing new questions over the attack on the US consulate in Libya, amid reports of military preparations to target those behind it. A Congressional committee asked whether repeated requests for more security at the Benghazi consulate were rejected. The US ambassador was among four Americans killed on 11 September. The US is gathering intelligence ahead of a possible military operation against those implicated, US media say.

The head of the UN refugee agency, Antonio Guterres, has warned hat the UNHCR and other humanitarian agencies are under increasing strain from a combination of simultaneous major new conflicts and unresolved old ones. In a speech at the annual meeting of UNHCR's Executive Committee in Geneva, Switzerland, Guterres said his organization was facing a level of refugee crises unmatched in its recent history.

Lawyers in Zambia have formed the Coalition for the Defence of Democratic Rights (CDDR) to defend civil rights in the country. In its inaugural statement issued Wednesday, the lawyers said the formation of the coalition became necessary because of the growing illegality and violence initiated by individuals, the the abuse of state power by the Executive to advance their private and political interests. The CDDR said it intends to make the international community aware of the current abuse of rights and threats of violence being deployed by President Michael Sata’s government, paving the way for future prosecution and accountability for the unlawful conduct currently being committed by the ruling Patriotic Front (PF).

Nathan Pajibo, like thousands of his fellow Liberians, has been living in Buduburam refugee camp near the Ghanaian capital Accra for over two decades after fleeing the civil war in 1990. In June 2012 he lost his refugee status alongside 11,000 Liberians across the region and the camp will soon be handed over to the district assembly, but lingering fear prevents Pajibo from returning. One of at least 6,000 Liberians still living at Buduburam, he is waiting for the Ghana Refugee Board to process his application. Some 4,000 ex-refugees have applied for local integration, around 1,000 will return to Liberia, and about 1,000 are applying for exemption to remain as refugees, according to the Ghana Refugee Board (GRB).

Flooding across Nigeria has killed at least 148 people and displaced more than 64 000, the Red Cross said Tuesday 2 October. The organisation is also warning of an increased risk that water-borne diseases like cholera could spread.

In the wake of the attack on the US embassy, Libya’s new government has proposed a worrying State of Emergency law that if put into action would rob citizens of the freedoms they fought so hard for. The draft would grant the authorities powers that clearly infringe on individual freedoms – such as the right to intercept communications of any kind and impose controls on the media.

Days after the presidents of Sudan and South Sudan signed a partial agreement in Addis Ababa, several voices have come out in opposition to some of the agreement’s clauses, particularly in Juba. A number of South Sudanese military commanders and politicians held a press conference declaring their opposition to the deal, particularly the resulting security arrangements.

The Sudanese security services were accused of beating and arresting several Darfuri students from the Bakht Alrida university in Aldoam, White Nile, on Monday 1 October, Radio Dabanga was informed. The exact number of arrested and injured students is still unknown. Witnesses said these students were holding a strike against the payment of tuition fees.