A team from the United Nations refugee agency has arrived in a Chadian border town to verify reports that 200 to 300 Sudanese refugees have been crossing weekly from the Darfur region into Chad since the beginning of April, an agency spokesman said.

Investigators from the Anti-Corruption Unit in the Mozambican Attorney-General's Office have questioned businessman Nyimpine Chissano, the oldest son of President Joaquim Chissano, in connection with the September 2002 escape from the Maputo top security prison of Anibal dos Santos Junior ("Anibalzinho"), reports Friday's issue of the independent weekly "Savana". Anibalzinho was the man who led the death squad recruited to assassinate Mozambique's top investigative journalist, Carlos Cardoso, in November 2000. After his mysterious disappearance from prison on 1 September 2002, he was tried in absentia.

The World Bank failed to protect social spending during its structural adjustment operations in the 1980s and 1990s, and this led to the deterioration of basic services - including those needed for the prevention and control of HIV/AIDS. And instead of focusing on HIV/AIDS, the World Bank sought improvements in the way goods and services were provided and financed through health sector reforms, such as user fees, privatisation, decentralisation and integration of services. These reforms frequently had the unintended effect of reducing access to effective health care, including services aimed at the prevention and control of HIV/AIDS. This is according to a paper Produced by ActionAid that evaluates the response to the HIV crisis by the World Bank.

The Inkatha Freedom Party has withdrawn its legal challenge to contest the declaration of the April 14 election as free and fair. IFP president Mangosuthu Buthelezi said although widespread irregularities occurred in South Africa and particularly in KwaZulu-Natal, the party had taken the decision not to proceed with the challenge in the interest of national unity. "It was never our intention to spoil the celebrations of our first decade of democracy. It is my earnest hope that our announcement will have the positive effect of ensuring that future elections will proceed without similar problems and acts of intimidation," Buthelezi said in a statement.

The UN’s main human rights body has demonstrated an incapacity and unwillingness to address serious human rights violations and must reform, said Amnesty International as the 60th session of the UN Commission on Human Rights drew to a close. The Commission failed to adopt draft resolutions on China, Chechnya, Zimbabwe and the detainees in Guantanamo Bay, repeatedly using the “no action” procedure to prevent discussion of resolutions on China and Zimbabwe. Amnesty International said: “The Commission has demonstrated that it must reform itself if it is to fulfil its responsibility to protect human rights and denounce violations wherever they occur.”

Fighting corruption at all levels with effective and transparent institutions was listed as the first battle-post in defining a pro-growth African agenda, as stipulated by studies conducted by the South African Institute for International Affairs. This, the organisation suggested, would involve the establishment of genuinely independent and well-funded anti-corruption authorities with the power to prosecute without political interference. It would also involve the strengthening of powers of banking and financial regulation to stop laundering illicit funds, improve public access to information on government spending, and publicly disclosing political party financing.

The Senate Foreign Relations Committee has started to investigate allegations of corruption in projects funded by the World Bank and its affiliates, Senate sources said Tuesday. Committee staff have been quietly looking into charges for some time and the first public hearing is set for May 13. Projects under review include the Yacyreta Dam on the Argentina-Paraguay border, the Lesotho Highlands Water Project and projects in Cambodia, according to letters obtained by Reuters.

Abdoulaye Wade of Senegal has once again reshuffled his cabinet, appointing his fourth prime minister in as many years. Idrissa Seck, who had headed the cabinet for the past 15 months, was sacked on Wednesday. He was replaced by Macky Sall, a 43-year-old petroleum engineer and unconditional supporter of Wade, who was previously Interior Minister. Political commentators said there were two main reasons for the reshuffle. Firstly, Wade wished to bring into government the Union for Renewal of Democracy - a small opposition party headed by Djibo Ka. Secondly, political commentators said, the 77-year-old president appeared to have fallen out with Seck and wanted to replace him with someone who would show more unconditional loyalty.

Hundreds of Tanzanians demonstrated in Dar es Salaam on Saturday to protest what they called "bad policies" of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund. Placard-waiving demonstrators marched through several streets shouting anti-globalisation slogans. "The demonstration has been staged to coincide with the 60th anniversary of the Bretton Woods institutions (on Sunday)," said Gemma Akilimali, an official with the Tanzania Gender Network Project, one of the non-governmental organisations that organised the march.

Zimbabwean police have arrested the country's Finance Minister, Chris Kuruneri, on corruption charges. He has been accused of illegally dealing in foreign currency held outside the country, worth more than ZIM$6bn ($1.38m). He is the first senior official in President Robert Mugabe's government to be detained in a corruption crackdown.

First a warm thanks to all at Pambazuka News who provide an invigorating forum and a vehicle for awareness & change.

Dear Eva,
(In response to Eva Dadrian, Letters, Pambazuka News 153)

Forgive me if I have offended you by using the example of a young girl who asked me to respite my ignorance of her history and a particular human atrocity. My point in using the Israeli example was not to offend the Palestinians – but to urge awareness of all human failure to find empathy and conquer ignorance within our communities. Perhaps it would have been more appropriate to highlight the example of the Arab Village where I later lived for some time, herding goats.

I had been warned, as two American tourists had just been killed in the Wadi Kelt, not to enter the village and to display distrust and reticence, but, despite this, I lived in the village in a sublime peace. As a white woman, in jeans and a t-shirt, I represented everything that the community should find unacceptable culturally speaking, yet I was privileged and trusted to take care of the village of Arab Al Ramshe’s 356 strong herd of goats, because it made me happy to be in the mountains with them – the entire wealth of the village goat herder and his family, a trust that defies thousands of years of tradition. They shared their stories of triumph with me, their stories of hope and tragedy, their heritage, their food and their home in a hospitable and respectful humility that I have seldom experienced in my travels since. They too taught me of awareness – that a one to one trust, devoid of history, soul to soul, was key to overcoming the violent approach that tragically some politicians fall prey to when first they take on positions of power.

I agree with you whole-heartedly that the dividing walls between us all should come down, that we should end apartheid in every form, but we need to remove it from our minds first or I do not believe we can achieve anything in practicality. We need to stop dredging up history for the sake of recrimination and reproach. If it cannot be a clear teacher for us then perhaps it should be mute.

I doubt very much that the young girl who took me to the holocaust museum at Akko had any idea what was to follow in her country but I very much believe, in learning to know her as a person, that she does not condone what is happening in her country today. Quite the contrary, I am certain it is breaking her heart. And certainly - I think she is now sensitive to it also. To some extent we are all victims of ignorance but I respect her duty to try and bridge that ignorance. More often than not, these issues are intentionally misrepresented. We are privileged to have the freedom to speak openly.

I think you are perfectly correct that we should listen with two ears and build awareness of all aspects of the phenomenon of genocide. This was the point of my letter and in fact, it was in order to address the situation in Rwanda, but yes you are right, it applies to America, Spain, South Africa and now Sudan. Is there a place where mankind has not failed himself. Can we try again?

I did not anywhere in my letter condone the attack on Palestinian children, instead I called for us as an African community to never become desensitized, which I can see you are not. You say No, No, No, Nicole, but in truth, I think we are agreed.

I think we are all participant in Pambazuka to find solutions and avoid recriminations. My solution may seem simplistic but I feel that change begins with love and love begins with understanding, so I thank you for your letter, I will read Tajudeen Abdul-Raheem's "When 'never again' becomes again and again" – again, and I invite you to write me to discuss this further so that you and I may build a bridge over the distance I have inadvertently created with you. Let us seek the things common between us and find solutions for Africa today. Indeed if I am offending you, please patiently teach me again and help me to understand. Can we begin with you and me? As Tajudeen says, can we “Keep Hope Alive”.

History has already recorded your substantial culpability during the Rwandan genocide ten years ago, and your failure to work effectively as head of UN peacekeeping during this terrible time. Judgment is a good deal more severe than your own recent admission that "you could have done more."

But with your present inadequate response, as UN Secretary-General, to the massive crimes against humanity, ethnic cleansing, and genocide in Darfur, Sudan, you are compounding your failures of 1994. Without immediate, urgent, and appropriately robust UN action, your failure to lead during this vast crisis will be beyond either forgiveness or redemption.

No subsequent apology for inaction, no claim of ignorance, can possibly have meaning. Your legacy will be to have twice acquiesced in the slaughter and destruction of hundreds of thousands of innocent African civilians. For the evidence of what is now occurring in Darfur is both utterly unambiguous and authoritative beyond possible dispute.

I would like to praise and commend you for the excellent enlightening work that you are doing. Thank you very much indeed for the updates and information sent.

The Namibian Society for Human Rights (NSHR) has strongly condemned what it says are several incidents of political corruption and bribery as well as intimidation over the last eight days. Pre-polling irregularities, vote buying, influence peddling and smear tactics as well as misuse of public funds characterize such incidents, the organisation said in a press statement.

A referendum on the draft constitution will plunge the country into political turmoil, Constitution of Kenya Review Commission vice-chairman Okoth Ogendo said. Kenyans must be prepared for an automatic enactment of the draft if it is subjected to a referendum. "If we go to a referendum on the entire document, we will immediately have a new political order," he told journalists at the commission's headquarters.

After rolling out an armoury of anti-corruption measures, the government should broaden the anti-graft net to cover a wide cross-section of the economy if it is to earn plaudits for honesty and seriousness in its drive, commentators said this week. To bring back a semblance of credence to the anti-corruption drive, the crusade, which has so far been dismissed by critics as a smoke-screen ahead of the crucial 2005 Parliamentary elections, should cover key sectors, they said. The crusade should particularly cover the mining and agricultural sectors, among others.

Rapid economic growth in East and South Asia over the last couple of decades has been responsible for a decrease in the number of people living in extreme poverty in developing countries, from 40 percent of global population in 1981 to 21 percent in 2001. However, Africa, Latin America, Eastern Europe and Central Asia are still far from reaching the U.N. Millennium Development Goal of halving poverty levels by 2015, says a new World Bank report. According to World Development Indicators 2004, East and South Asia, particularly China and India, have lifted 500 million people out of extreme poverty - those living on less than $1 a day - in 20 years.

As the World Bank convened for its spring meetings this weekend, Public Citizen released a new report that highlighted how the World Bank continued to promote water privatization despite its assertion that it had modified its stance on privatization policies after a series of failed experiments around the world. A review of World Bank lending from 2000 through 2004 reveals that while the Bank’s public relations rhetoric has changed in the face of increasing global resistance to privatized water services, its loan policies in the water sector have not changed at all. The World Bank is pressuring governments to privatize water services, thereby ceding control of them to major transnational corporations, as part of the package of policies required before governments can access loans for building and repairing water and sanitation systems.

"We need to learn more about the slave trade, find out the roles of our ancestors in its perpetration, use it as a basis to understand our brothers and sisters in the Diaspora, and find out how to turn that tragedy into something more positive for our country, our continent and our people both here and in the Diaspora." These were the words of Mr Jake Obetsebi Lamptey, Minister of Tourism and Modernization of the Capital City, when he launched this year's Emancipation Day celebration under a sub-theme: "Retracing Our Steps-The Path to Development" on April 14 in Accra.

Nexus International and a host of African community organisations are organising for the first time an African “Third Sector” Conference on the theme “The Third Sector, Overseas Missions in the UK, Innovation & African Development” that will bring together African Overseas Missions in the UK, African development organisations, international NGOs and philanthropic individuals from Africa. This Conference will also celebrate the positive role of Africans in their own development, and explore ways by which a reasonable framework and level of co-operation and collaborative networks could be established.