A Zimbabwean government-run newspaper has accused an expert attached to a parliamentary committee heading the country’s controversial constitution making of spying for South African President Jacob Zuma. The allegations followed a week of heated exchanges between Pretoria and Harare over the timing of Zimbabwe’s next elections. President Robert Mugabe’s Zanu-PF party last week accused South Africa of gross interference after its Foreign Affairs minister Maite Nkoana-Mashabane insisted her government needed to see full reforms before elections are held.

Thousands of Rwandan refugees living in Uganda remain unwilling to return home, citing a fear of persecution, despite the UN Refugee Agency’s (UNHCR) invocation of a clause ending their refugee status. '[Since May 2009], no Rwandan refugee of any profile, either urban or rural, has expressed [a] willingness to return back home,' Manzi Mutuyimana, one of the refugees, told IRIN. 'Conditions which could make [a] safe return with dignity [do not exist] in Rwanda.' The refugees and asylum-seekers fled to Uganda between 1959 and 1998.

Khayelitsha NGO Equal Education has announced it will take basic education minister Angie Motshekga, finance minister Pravin Gordhan and the nine provincial MECs to court for their collective failures on school infrastructure. EE claims it’ll be the most far-reaching case about basic education in post-apartheid South Africa. In its 582-page founding affidavit, Equal Education, a movement made up of pupils, teachers and parents, says Motshekga has failed to exercise the powers section 5A of the SA Schools Act gives her to prescribe minima for school infrastructure.

Defence Minister Stephen Smith insists Australian soldiers and spies overseas always act within legal restraints, but he has refused to comment on the secret operations of Australian commandos in Africa. Fairfax Media revealed the previously classified operations of Special Air Service 4 Squadron, raised in secret in 2005 and deployed to at least three African nations for covert intelligence collection. The troops have operated out of uniform in Kenya, Nigeria and Zimbabwe.

For over five years, thousands of displaced people have been living in camps in North Kivu. This report analyses the camps of Bihito, Kalinga, Kilimani, and Lushebere, located in Masisi, a territory especially affected by displacement. In order to gain a better understanding of durable solutions that are suitable for the IDPs living in the camps, this report investigates the causes behind their displacement, as well as their living conditions and their prospects for the future. Finally, it offers concrete suggestions to the actors involved, such as authorities in DRC, as well as international and Congolese organisations that provide assistance and protection to IDPs in the camps and support durable solutions to their displacement.

Every year, hundreds of thousands of women around the world die during childbirth because they lack access to the medical assistance they need. On International Women’s Day, 8 March, MSF released a report, 'Maternal Death: The Avoidable Crisis', that details the profound, life-saving impact quality emergency obstetric care can have for pregnant women who are trying to endure acute and chronic humanitarian crises. Download the report from the website.

This report identifies Norway’s loans to Tunisia, Egypt and Bahrain, and discusses the legitimacy of this debt. Norway has lent money to these countries through bilateral debt and through investments in government bonds. Should a new regime, when it has been established, inherit the debt from the previous regime?

The authors of the paper ‘Treading Troubled Waters’ speak of the critical situations faced by the water sector on the strength of a process that involved partnerships, network of academic institutions, peoples and non-government organizations, and local communities. This process undertaken through the Development Roundtable Series (DRTS) program initiated and anchored by Focus on the Global South-Philippines, involved consultations, roundtable discussion, research and case studies across the country. These activities have produced both anecdotal information and hard data from the field and existing documents.

An armed group ambushed a public bus and killed 19 people in western Ethiopia region of Gambela, officials have confirmed. The Monday 12 March incident occurred some 20 kilometres from the regional capital, Gambela town. According to an eye witness, people armed with machine-guns, abducted five female passengers out of the 34, who were in the bus. Seven other people were severely wounded.

Seven opposition MPs are spearheading a move to remove President Museveni from office. The legislators who launched the impeachment process this morning, after signing a petition, are soliciting for signatures from their colleagues. They accuse the President of abuse of office and committing economic crimes in contravention of the Constitution.

Gambia's six main opposition parties have opted out of the parliamentary elections, alleging unfair treatment by the Independent Electoral Commission (IEC), which has refused to heed their request for a postponement of the polls from 29 March, PANA confirmed. PANA reports that the IEC insisted that the election date will remain as scheduled. In addition, the IEC received nomination forms for candidates for the exercise between 8-10 March and even went ahead to declare 24 candidates from the ruling party 'returned unopposed'. As it is now, only 24 parliamentary seats remain to be contested for.

The World Socialist Website reports on German study published by the government on young muslims in the country. The study’s publication has become the occasion for a renewed campaign against immigrant communities in Germany. A 'deliberate political campaign seeks to limit the study’s findings to that which can be exploited for the dissemination of xenophobic sentiments. In fact, the 750-page report provides a much more nuanced picture. The fact that the researchers are critical of the government’s integration policy is being swept under the carpet.'

The gist of the paper is how the World Development Report shows that the Bank now acknowledges that '...social and cultural factors make it difficult for women to participate with equal rights in the social and political life of their societies.' This statement isn't groundbreaking in itself, but it shows a sea change in how the World Bank thinks about women's equality. In the past, they viewed gender equality as a natural side effect of bringing greater prosperity to a region.

Mauritania dispatched its top diplomat to neighbouring Mali to counter media reports that it was backing Malian rebels fighting for independence in the desert north. The Mauritanian foreign minister expressed his country's support for Mali's authorities. His visit came as rebel fighters arrived within 135 km (80 miles) of Timbuktu, the capital of one of three northern regions they want to annex to create a new state on the edge of the Sahara.

This handbook is a timely, illustrated and easy-to-read guide and resource material for journalists. It evolved primarily out of a desire to equip all journalists with more information and understanding of gender issues in their work. It is addressed to media organisations, professional associations and journalists’ unions seeking to contribute to the goal of gender equality.

Ethiopian authorities have inadvertently revealed the existence of highly ambitious plans to resettle Lower Omo Valley tribes who stand in the way of a massive plantations scheme. The map was included in an internal report by the country’s Wildlife Conservation Authority (EWCA), into the environmental impact of planned sugarcane plantations in the Omo. Leaked to Survival International, the map shows where Ethiopia intends to resettle tribes whose land and communities stand in the way of their ‘development’ plans.

There is battle raging across the world over who can better feed its people: small-scale farmers practicing sustainable agriculture, or giant agribusinesses using chemical fertilizers and pesticides. It was small-scale organic farmers growing rice for themselves and local markets in the Philippines who first convinced us that they could feed both their communities and their country. Part of what convinced us was simple economics: These farmers demonstrated substantial immediate savings from eliminating chemical inputs while, within a few harvests - if not immediately - their yields were close to or above their previous harvests. From these farmers, we also learned of the health and environmental benefits from this shift.

Gunshots rocked Amuru District as the police tried to disperse about 100 people who had crossed from Adjumani District to the disputed border area of Elegu, to reportedly distribute plots of land among themselves. Although Atiak residents in Amuru District claim legitimacy over the land, the Ofodro clan members in Arinyapi Sub-county district claim the land, that has since become lucrative, belongs to their grandparents and that they only abandoned it during insecurity.

Thousands of members of the Democratic Opposition Coordinatioon (COD) in Mauritania, grouping 12 opposition political parties, mounted a massive demonstration here Monday 12 March, to press for an end to military rule. They also denounced 'the increasingly difficult and harsh living conditions, the exclusion of some tribes in the country and the inability of the government to manage a crisis-ridden Mauritania.'

Ten months after the West African country started to emerge from a presidential election crisis during which almost all hospitals and clinics had to shut down for a good six months because they had been vandalised, looted and occupied, the new government under President Alassane Ouattara is trying to make public health care a priority. But in a country recovering from 12 years of political instability since a military coup in December 1999 that was followed by 10 years of Gbagbo’s autocratic rule, rebuilding a crumbling public health care system takes time.