The cholera outbreak reported in Kampala and Wakiso has spread to six other districts, health minister Jim Muhwezi says.

The Writers in Prison Committee of International PEN is deeply concerned at the news of the detention of Ezra Fessehaye, a journalist with the government-owned newspaper "Hadas Eritrea". According to PEN's sources, Fessehaye was arrested by security forces in July 2002 and has not been heard of since.

The book 'Solar Energy Systems Design' is offered in a newly revised and free version on this Web site. It is an excellent resource to learn about solar power and the technology that is used to harness it. Seven chapters describe how the sun itself produces energy, how the sun's position relative to the earth's surface effects energy system generation, and how various collectors work. In addition to the text, there is an overview of the J.T. Lyle Center for Regenerative Studies, an institution that envisions a society only dependent on renewable forms of energy. (Source: The NSDL Scout Report for Math, Engineering, and Technology, Copyright 1994-2002)

4t HIT Mail Privacy Lite allows you to send and receive data securely hidden in images of various types (gif, jpeg, tiff, etc). This application uses a strong encryption algorithm to make communications secure.

Somali Civil Society News is delivered by email every two weeks and is part of a project that aims for the achievement of permanent respect for human rights, justice through rule of law, pluralism, good governance and sustainable peace in Somalia and Somaliland. For more information on this project visit http://www.somali-civilsociety.org. The newsletter contains links to stories about the Horn of Africa region in various content categories. For free subscription send an email to [email protected]

Radio should be used more effectively to communicate science and technology in Africa, according to South African minister of arts, culture, science and technology, Ben Ngubane.

A senior public servant assaulted journalist McDonald Chapalapata, of "The Nation" newspaper on November 28. "He pounced on me as I took notes and I fell to the floor. He smashed my cell phone and my company dictaphone against a wall," Chapalapata, who sustained injuries to his face and arm, told NAMISA.

University of Botswana (UB) students, armed with bricks and stones, attacked two journalists from the bi-weekly newspaper "Mokgosi" on 5 December 2002.

An online discussion forum for non-governmental organisations and civil society to discuss their input in the Final Declarations of the World Summit of the Information Society (WSIS; Geneva 2003, Tunis 2005) will be held on UNESCO's website at http://wsisforum.unesco.org from 9 December 2002 to 15 January 2003.

Liberian authorities released journalist Hassan Bility, whom authorities had held incommunicado since June 24 as a "prisoner of war." According to news reports, Bility, editor of the independent weekly The Analyst, was released without being charged or tried. He left the country for an undisclosed location.

News has reached us that Joseph Eneko, Governor of Ituri in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and member of the Rassemblement Congolais pour la Democratie/Kisangani (RCD/Kisangani) was murdered on November 21, 2002. This murder is not just one more name in a long list of those lost in the mini-world war that has been gripping central Africa. The peace and reconciliation efforts in the DRC are seriously undermined by such assassinations, potentially plunging that country further into a cycle of endless death squads, retaliations and full-scale war. Facilitating the resolution of the civil war in the DRC must become a major focus of the attention of the newly formed African Union. The full array of diplomatic initiatives will be necessary in order to bring about not only a cessation of violence, but a just resolution of the demands for democracy and popular control on the part of the people of the Congo. Attempts at continental development and an African Renaissance will go nowhere as long as the open sores represented by the crises of the DRC as well as other hotspots such as Zimbabwe, go unhealed. It is critical that supporters of peace and justice for the DRC speak out against terror as represented by the murder of Governor Eneko. We in the Diaspora cannot afford to turn a blind eye to such events.

Geraldine Fraser-Moleketi, minister of the Department of Public Service and Administration, will address the Global Forum on Thursday to highlight SA's goals in implementing electronic government.

These submissions intend to highlight provisions in the Access to Information and Protection of Privacy Bill, which offend against various sections of the Constitution. This includes most specifically sections (18)(1) - the right to the protection of the law and section (20) - the right to freedom of expression and to freely receive and impart information and ideas.

In the months since the presidential election the privately owned media have been consistently reporting incidents of political violence around the country, mostly against opposition MDC officials or those perceived to be the party's supporters. The government-controlled media on the other hand, has virtually ignored the development of this frightening "norm" in Zimbabwean society, giving the impression that politically motivated violence no longer occurs in Zimbabwe, says the Media Monitoring Project Zimbabwe.

On 4 December 2002, a major victory for press freedom in Zimbabwe was won when a Harare magistrate dropped charges against three journalists from "The Standard". The three journalists were accused of publishing falsehoods under the draconian Access to Information and Protection of Privacy Act (AIPPA).

Maputo loan shark Nini Satar and Nyimpine Chissano, the president's son, confronted each other across the floor of the courtroom during the Carlos Cardosa murder trial and called each other liars. Nini, on trial for the murder of Carlos Cardoso, says he met Nyimpine repeatedly and was given cheques by Nyimpine to pay for the Cardoso murder. Nyimpine, appearing as a witness last Thursday and Friday, says he met Nini only once and that the cheques were given to Maria Candida Cossa as security for a loan. Nympine needed the money to stop being taken to court by Budget Rent-a-Car, and claimed Cossa sold the cheques on to Nini.

Initiated in 1987, "Synergy Gender and Development" (Synfev), of Enda Third World, conducts activities in an effort to benefit women by promoting gender equality, peace, and sustainable development. The programme aims to help Francophone African women escape poverty, victimisation, and marginilisation by improving their capacities with regard to ICTs. An underlying commitment is to enable these women to retain their personal and cultural identities in the face of globalisation.

Global Vision International has recently launched its new website, www.gvi.org.uk, which will assist charities, non-profits, NGO's and governmental organisations around the world to source volunteers and raise funds for their conservation, research, and community development projects. This new venture offers participating organisations development assistance in establishing a volunteer programme to help provide access to committed human resources and funding through a share of volunteer donations. Each fundraising and volunteer recruitment scheme is tailored to the individual programme to ensure that the participating organisation gets maximum benefit from Global Vision's Support.

The Committee to Protect Journalists has added a new feature to its Web site dedicated to the ongoing criminal trial in Mozambique of suspects in the Carlos Cardoso murder case. Cardoso, Mozambique's leading investigative reporter, was gunned down on November 22, 2000. Six people were arrested in March 2001 for the murder.

Residents in Senegal are bettering their livelihood, improving their businesses and maintaining contact with family and friends through telecentres. The computer hubs are allowing residents to get online at reasonable prices to search for information and even improve business efficiencies. More and more centres are springing up around Senegal, giving residents a new opportunity to learn about technology and benefit from its access.