Thousands of mourners have attended the funeral of the Sudanese newspaper editor whose beheaded body was found in Khartoum after he was kidnapped. Many people wept openly as Mohammed Taha's body was carried on a wooden bed from his home to the cemetery. The BBC's Alfred Taban says the killing has shocked Sudan.

A Somali radio station has resumed broadcasting after it was closed down by Islamist leaders for playing local love songs. However, Radio Jowhar is no longer playing any music, even jingles. The Union of Islamic Courts, which controls much of the south, is split between hardliners, who want Taleban-style rule, and moderates.

Killings, harassment or jailing of journalists have risen to an alarming level across Africa and could undermine the continent's drive for better governance, foreign media groups said. "In the past few months journalists working in Africa have been charged with espionage, murdered, harassed by government officials, and jailed for defamation and for publishing 'false news'," said a joint statement by the Foreign Correspondents' Association of Southern Africa and its East African counterpart.

The Congress regularly attracts over 750 participants from 55 countries worldwide, and with more than 45% of attendees holding senior-level positions at CEO/Director level, the opportunity for peer-to-peer networking is unparalleled.

The provision of telecom services in most countries was provided by either public administrations, departments in the civil service or state-owned enterprises. While others, especially, USA opted for a system of issuing licences to private companies to operate as monopolies in specific geographic areas. Developments in the 1980s and the 1990s changed the landscape of the telecom industry.

Highway Africa is an annual ICT conference hosted by Rhodes University which is situated in Grahamstown, South Africa. Each year, more than 500 delegates from across the globe attend the conference to discuss issues relating to Internet governance, ICT policy and media for democracy.

The Internet has the potential to bring the art and science of fundraising back into balance, restore the confidence and trust of donors, and deeply enhance the relationships our organizations have with our stakeholders. Or it can be yet another way to alienate our supporters and disempower our fundraising professionals.

The Media Institute of Southern Africa (Misa) has condemned bodyguards' destruction of media photographs of President Thabo Mbeki entering a Pretoria Medi-Clinic. This amounted to "gross censorship unacceptable under South Africa's Constitution", Misa-South Africa's chairperson Raymond Louw said.

GAMTEL is the primary provider of telecommunications and related services in The Gambia. The company’s main objective is to be a leader in providing world-class communications services.

President Yahya Jammeh Monday (Seotember 4) told party supporters at Sabakh Sanjal constituency, about 200 kilometres from Banjul the capital, on his campaign trail for the September 22 presidential elections that neither coup d’etat nor elections will remove him from power. “

The New Partnership for African Development (NEPAD)’s Information and Technology (ICT) broadband infrastructure network could fail if most African countries do not sign the project’s protocol, press reports said. The Daily Times of Malawi reported that out of 23 NEPAD member states, only six countries have signed the protocol, a development which experts say may jeopardise the project.

Two Niger journalists have been jailed for 18 months over an article which criticised PM Hama Amadou. The publisher and editor of Le Republicain, Maman Abou and Omar Keita Lalo, were also fined $10,000 (£5,250) for spreading false news. The article said Mr Amadou preferred ties with Iran to those with the West.

August 18 marked the launch of a campaign to spread consumer awareness about telecommunications in South Africa. The campaign is inspired by successful consumer advocacy campaigns such as the Spread Firefox campaign, where thousands of grassroots activists pledged money to take out a double-page spread in the New York Times telling the world that there was an open source alternative to Microsoft Internet Explorer.

Ernest Ndukwe, executive vice chairman of the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC), has described Voice Over Internet Protocol (VoIP) as the engine that will drive telephony in developing countries like Nigeria. Speaking at the first day of the three-day VoIP forum in Lagos, Ndukwe said the commission had recently conducted a study into the Nigerian telecommunications market.

This journal highlights that culture is superimposed on many aspects that deal with women's rights, even in contexts that one would not expect the culture discourse to be prominent in. Contributors unanimously raise attitudes towards women and girls as being a grave concern, and we debate culture with relation to gender and inequality.

The international advocacy organisation freedominfo.org has just released its report Freedom of Information Around the World 2006: A Global Survey of Access to Government Records Laws. The report provides an overview of access to information laws from dozens of countries.

Librarians from across Africa have launched an information exchange network to promote access to, and more effective use of, government information for democratic and economic development on the continent, following a workshop in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, co-sponsored by the International Federation of Library Associations (IFLA) and the U.N. Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA).

The 63 members of Women of Zimbabwe Arise (WOZA) charged with breaching the peace while conducting a peaceful Valentine's Day protest outside Parliament on February 14, 2006, have been found not guilty. The Provincial Magistrate read out a 10-minute ruling after a 14-day trial that saw four police officers and 55 women take the stand to testify.

A senior Zimbabwe official said Wednesday (August 30) that Harare is determined to press ahead with draft legislation that would allow authorities to monitor phone calls and Internet communications, despite public hearing testimony from opposition politicians, media representatives, human rights groups and others that the bill should be scuttled.

Thanks for this review of Article 19's Broadcasting Pluralism and Diversity manual (http://www.pambazuka.org/en/category/books/36699). Article 19 plans to produce a second edition of the manual next year and we will take into account Fackson Banda's comments. The manual has been published under the Creative Commons licence and we welcome comments, additions and practical examples of its use.