Prime Minister Hage Geingob has reacted angrily to the termination of the popular radio program Prime Minister's Question Time by the Namibian Broadcasting Corporation (NBC) saying the move is political and promising to take the matter up with the Politburo.

The Barakaat Telecommunications Company, the largest in Somalia, has closed down its international telephone services throughout Somalia, after its British and American business partners terminated their relationship with the Al-Barakaat group, a senior company official told IRIN. The move has greatly limited telephone contact between the country and the outside world.

E-mail service aimed primarily at people interested in using information and communication technologies to improve the quality of education in the developing world.

The terrorist attacks of September 11 seem to have changed world politics dramatically. New and unexpected alliances are forged, the priorities of governments are reassessed, public attention is focused on the threat of terrorism. A global "war against terrorism" seems to be unleashed, that is geared to stay with us the coming years. What do these developments mean for the road to the World Summit on Sustainable Development? This UN Summit will be held in Johannesburg (South Africa) in September 2002, ten years after the historical Rio Conference on Environment and Development, and one year after the attacks in New York and Washington. Still, preparations for the Summit go on apparently untouched by the recent events. But if everything changes, can the Johannesburg Summit and its preparatory process remain untouched?

Deadline for submission of abstracts is February 01, 2002

International Institute Of Infonomics Maastricht (The Netherlands)

The week provided ample evidence that the recent changes and restructuring in the government-controlled media engineered by the Ministry of Information are now paying dividends. The two main media institutions, Zimbabwe Newspapers and ZBC, have now become dedicated, professional and efficient propaganda machines for the government, manipulating the news in favour of the ruling party at the expense of the truth. There can no longer be any question that the constant stream of coordinated misinformation being disseminated by these two organizations is a grave and extreme abuse of journalistic standards.

Education creates the skills through which Africa will take advantage of "getting connected". Yet many African universities lack the means or the expertise to offer their students these benefits. Even in a campus as "wired" as the University of Jos, those involved are effectively "first-time" buyers in this field. Working out of the US’s University of Iowa, WiderNet has been finding ways of overcoming these barriers for Nigeria’s University of Jos and building links between Iowan and Nigerian scholars. Bonnie Pedersen from WiderNet explains. As usual, News Update features many other interesting articles. Read more on this or other articles.

'Tattoo it on your butt if you have to' - the directives and, er, inspiration supplied by Microsoft (MS) top management to sales staff are commented upon in this article from The Register, which features a memo from MS veep Brian Valentine.

A friend of mine who visited California bought me a wonderful hologram bookmark from The Tech, so I was especially interested to read this article about their awards program for innovations which assist poor communities.

This article addresses issues of equitable employment and skills building. The importance of mentoring and skills transfer in the ICT field is emphasised with clarity and insight.

The Top Black ICT Acheivers in South Africa will be announced at an award ceremony in Johannesburg this weekend. The seven awards include one for top black woman in ICT and the presidential award for bridging the digital divide.

There have been over 150 recorded cases of bubonic plague in Nebbi and Arua Districts, northwestern Uganda, as of the end of October, and at least 25 deaths, according to the latest humanitarian update from the UN office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) in the Ugandan capital, Kampala.

The American Dream may be souring, some even say it's turning into a nightmare. America's tragedy is that the world is more acutely aware of this than Americans themselves. Not just Muslims, but everyone now talks of US double standards. Instead of this world-wide perception aggravating their persecution complex, Americans should listen to criticism from unbiased countries. And then in the robust US style, do something about it, if they are to steer the course of this war away from disaster lane.

Rather than trying to shut down the new computer networks that allow people to directly connect other personal computers, the military wants to enlist their creators in the war against terrorism.

The editor of Zimbabwe's only privately owned daily newspaper, The Daily News, has been arrested, for the second time in less than three months, raising fears of a widening crackdown by the government against its opposition ahead of next year's elections.