Scientists have shown that the cholera pathogen came to Haiti with foreign UN troops who carried the bacteria in their bodies, and whose military base was dumping its sewage into a nearby river. The imported disease has claimed more than 7,000 lives and continues to ravage communities across Haiti. Read more about the this issue on the website.

South African social justice organisation Ndifuna Ukwazi have released their first e-newsletter. Visit the website through the URL provided to subscribe.

The sentencing of a young Sudanese woman to death by stoning for adultery presents numerous grave violations of domestic and international law, Human Rights Watch said. The sentence also underscores the urgent need for Sudan to reform its legal system in accordance with its human rights obligations, Human Rights Watch said. Intisar Sharif Abdallah, whose age has not been determined but is believed to be under the age of 18, was sentenced by a judge on 22 April 2012, in the city of Omdurman, near Khartoum. Since her sentencing, she been held in Omdurman prison with her five-month-old baby, with her legs shackled.

The Second Istanbul Conference on Somalia, under the theme 'Preparing Somalia's Future: Goals for 2015', took place on 31st May and 1st June 2012. Maintaining the multi-dimensional and multi-layered approach of the first Istanbul Conference in 2010 onSomalia, it was attended by high level representatives from 57 countries and 11 international and regional organizations, as well as by the TFG leadership, the regional administrations, and representatives from wide-ranging segments of Somali society, including youth, women, business community, elders, religious leaders and the Diaspora.

The department of basic education faces court action over its failure to fully fill the tens of thousands of teaching posts the Eastern Cape needs. The basic education department is being dragged before court again, this time over the embattled Eastern Cape education department’s failure to fully fill 64,752 posts for 2012 and wholly fill the 64,752 teaching posts it budgeted for in the province.

Unions have given the government 24 hours to agree to terms to avoid a wage dispute that would throw the public service sector into disarray. Public sector unions have united in rejecting the government’s wage offer, which – as it is now – would see salaries in these sectors increase by 6.5 per cent and the housing allowance by R100. Unions are demanding an 8 per cent wage increment and R1,500 housing allowance, while the state is offering R900 for a housing allowance, an increase from the current R800. This adjustment would be effective for six months only.

We invite you to join us in Monastir from the 12th to the 17th of July where we will launch together the process towards the World Social Forum 2013.

Farm invasions are 'inevitable' should white South Africans not voluntarily hand over land to the government, says the ANC Youth League. “If they don’t want to see angry black youths flooding their farms they must come to the party. Whites must volunteer some of the land and mines they own.' Lamola was speaking at the end of a youth league policy workshop held in preparation for the ANC policy conference later this month.

The withdrawal of Dominion Uganda Ltd from exploration around Lake Edward - an area which, according to independent petroleum geologists, may hold between 90 million and 1.1 billion barrels of oil - leaves a plethora of unanswered questions swirling around an industry that, in Uganda, remains no more transparent than a dollop of waxy crude. Why did Dominion pull out? What happened to a ‘Letter of Intent’ its parent company, UK-based Ophir Energy, signed in March 2012 with Canadian wildcatter, Octant Energy Corp., giving Octant an 80 per cent share in, and operatorship of, Exploration Area 4B? Did the government of Uganda approve these deals? And where does this leave the mysterious Alpha Oil - a Ugandan owned company that, in one of the sector’s best kept secrets, for many years held a five per cent stake in Exploration Area 4B?

Egyptians continue their million-man march in Cairo, Alexandria and Suez to voice their anger at the lenient sentence handed to ousted dictator Hosni Mubarak. The protesters gathered in the capital's iconic Liberation Square and other cities to urge the retrial of Mubarak and his two sons, demanding the death penalty for the octogenarian dictator. The demonstrators also called for unity among all political parties to prevent the re-emergence of the Mubarak-era dictatorship.

An Egypt court acquitted 13 police officers who were accused of killing six people and injuring 18 others on January 28 and 29, 2011, during the uprising that ousted the former regime, outside a police station in Giza. The six men were killed in what was known as the Friday of Anger that saw hundreds of others die at the hands of the police, who tried to suppress the uprising. The police officers defense accused the families of the dead of trying to prosecute the officers 'out of greed' as they were accused of aiming for state compensation.

New genetically altered corn aimed at helping farmers deal with drought offers more hype than help over the long term, according to a report issued by a science and environmental advocacy group. The Union for Concerned Scientists (UCS) said the only genetically altered corn approved by regulators and undergoing field trials in the United States has no improved water efficiency, and provides only modest results in only moderate drought conditions.

This post from the blog Africa is a Country reflects on the film Safe House, starring Denzil Washington, which was filmed in Cape Town. Washington had previously been quoted as saying he felt more comfortable making the film in a 'black' country, but as Loren A Lynch points out, the film perpetuates Hollywood stereotypes. 'The majority of audiences rarely see past guise of set dressing into the political and racial implications of not only the film but also of the film industry itself. Western audiences remain content with Hollywood’s constructed perceptions of both countries and cultures outside of their own, when in reality the differences stick out almost as much as Denzel Washington in a “brown” country.'

When you stand on the island of Rukwanzi at the heart of Lake Albert, your first thought, echoing perhaps the casual rhetoric of the region’s oil men, is that you are at the edge of a new frontier. But for its communities the lake is a centre, a point of connection and integration, the great body of water into which the White Nile flows, part of the vast rift valley that draws Africa’s citizens into mutual dependency. What happens here matters to half a dozen neighbouring countries. But the lines being drawn now, as neat and straight as the borders on colonial maps, mark not sovereign territory, but exploration blocks for oil and gas companies. Just a few miles from Rukwanzi six Congolese were killed in September 2007, shot at by the Ugandan army while they travelled in a passenger ferry from the island to the DRC shore. It was revealed last week that Heritage Oil and Gas, the British wildcat explorer founded by former mercenary Tony Buckingham, played a key role in triggering that military operation after its staff had crossed illegally into Congolese waters.

The politician who led Lesotho for the last 14 years will now be leading the opposition after his party failed to win a majority in parliament in weekend elections in this mountainous southern African country. A day after Pakalitha Mosisili resigned as prime minister, Lincoln Ralechate Mokose, the secretary general of his Democratic Congress Party, said in a telephone interview that 'our stand is to concede and work in parliament as opposition'.

Ahead of the ANC policy conference, Cosatu's second-largest affiliate is flexing its muscles - calling for nationalisation and radical land reform. National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa (Numsa) general secretary Irvin Jim wants the union’s national conference in Durban this week to discuss the review of the South African Constitution, including changes to the property clause, seen by some within the ANC-led alliance as an impediment to social and economic transformation in the country.

Police have fired tear gas to disperse supporters of Zimbabwe Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai's MDC party outside a courthouse. About 200 demonstrators gathered outside the high court in downtown Harare on Monday 4 June to protest charges being brought against 29 activists of the former opposition appearing there for a bail hearing. The activists are seeking bail on charges of murdering a police officer a year ago.

A doctor examined the detainees and told them that they were in a bad condition and should stop their hunger strike.

The Freedom of Expression Institute and Section 16 have applied to become friends of the court in the hate speech case against Julius Malema. The Freedom of Expression Institute and Section 16 have applied to become friends of the court in the hate speech case against Julius Malema. 'Hate speech is a very important and delicate issue for South African democracy,' said Melissa Moore, executive officer for the non-governmental organisation Section 16.

As midwestern Uganda gears up for oil production that will entail billions of dollars in investments, a range of central government officials interviewed by Oil in Uganda admit that there is no overall development plan for the region, and no mechanism for coordinating the efforts of different departments. 'Government has not designed any development plan for the oil region. We did not even have a development plan for the oil refinery in Hoima District until recently when the Ministry of Energy came up with one,' admits Johnson Mugume, a senior advisor to the Ministry of Finance, Planning and Economic Development. The refinery plan itself, he adds, is still in its infancy and will take years of work to finalise.