The Committee to Protect Journalists is concerned by attacks on radio stations in the Comoros in the run-up to May 14 federal elections in the Indian Ocean state. Unidentified assailants armed with machetes stormed two radio stations on the island of Grande Comore on May 5, forcing them off the air for 24 hours. The army shut down a radio station on the island of Mohéli more than a week ago, and it has not resumed broadcasting, local journalists told CPJ. Attackers ransacked Radio Ngazidja, the official station of the semi-autonomous government of Grande Comore, and Moroni FM, a private station that supports the federal government.

As the Comoros prepare for upcoming elections that will test their new power-sharing arrangement, South Africa is gearing up to do its part in ensuring the April elections are free and fair. Following a one-week fact-finding mission to assess the archipelago's readiness and requirements for the elections, a South African technical delegation presented their findings to the African Union's (AU) Peace and Security Committee.

Human rights activists on the Comoran island of Anjouan have accused the government of riding roughshod over basic civil liberties, which has contributed to growing hostility between the state and the local population. The latest incident occurred in early March, when ongoing public protests over a teachers' strike left two high school students dead, amid allegations of heavy-handed police conduct. In what it claimed were legitimate concerns over national security, authorities on the tiny island imposed an immediate curfew in the capital, Mutsamudu.

Reporters sans frontières (RSF) has urged authorities on the autonomous island of Anjouan to allow the island's main radio station, Radio Dzialandzé Mutsamudu (RDM), to resume its daily news programme, after it was suspended "until further notice" on 13 January 2005, under the orders of the Interior and Information Ministry.

Scores of students in Moroni, the capital of the Comoros Islands, took to the streets on Tuesday, demanding government action to end a teachers' strike that has closed schools. More than 300 teachers across the Indian Ocean archipelago failed to turn up for classes at the start of the school term earlier this month, protesting accumulated salary arrears.

Teachers in the Comoros on Monday threatened to continue strike action unless they received more than five months' back payment. In response to a strike called by their union, more than 300 educators across the Indian Ocean archipelago failed to turn up for classes on Sunday, protesting against accumulated salary arrears.

Federal President Azali Assoumani suffered a setback in parliamentary elections held at the weekend when parties aligned to the archipelego's three regional presidents gained the majority of seats in the national assembly. Following run-off elections for the federal assembly on Sunday, supporters of the presidents of the three semi-autonomous islands hold 12 of the 18 elected seats in parliament, against six for the federal president's party.

After a two-week mission to the Comoros, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) said it would be impossible to draw up an economic programme for the archipelago in the short term until the current political situation was clarified. Since the introduction of a new political system which granted the islands of Moheli, Anjouan and Grande Comore their own federal presidents, a political tussle has ensued over how the separation of powers between the federal presidents and the Union president would work.

The military continued to surround key government buildings on the main Comoros island of Grande Comore on Monday as a power struggle for control of key ministries continued.

Comoros Electoral Commission has declared last week's presidential poll invalid and ordered a revote.

The failure of a coup attempt over the weekend on the breakaway Comoros island of Anjouan has raised optimism among pro-union parties that a referendum across the archipelago on a new constitution to end the country's secessionist crisis will go ahead in December as scheduled.

Reports from the Comoros Islands say there has been gunfire in the capital, Moroni. The French news agency, AFP, said it lasted for about an hour in the north of the town. It followed days of protest against alleged police corruption and unpaid salaries.