Rwanda has expressed its concern over the way the authorities in South Africa are investigating the shooting of a former Rwandan army chief of staff. Lt Gen Faustin Kayumba Nyamwasa was wounded outside his house in Johannesburg last month.

In Thohoyandou, Limpopo, South Africa, a High Court judge decided on a court application which was served on members of the Venda royal family, chiefs, the Minister of Rural Development and various government departments to halt the defilement of a sacred waterfall. The complainants are members of Dzomo la Mupo (voice of the Earth) – elders and custodians of Venda sacred sites – plus members of the Ramunangi clan in whose area the Phiphidi Falls are situated.

Fahamu’s Refugee Programme is pleased to announce the June edition of the Fahamu Refugee e-Newsletter, a monthly publication that aims to provide a forum for providers of refugee legal aid. With a focus on the global South, it aims to serve the needs of legal aid providers as well as raise awareness of refugee concerns among the wider readership of Pambazuka News. The e-Newsletter follows recent developments in the interpretation of refugee law; case law precedents from other constituencies; reports and helpful resources for refugee legal aid NGOs; and stories of struggle and success in refugee legal aid work. It welcomes contributions from legal aid providers, refugees, and others interested or involved in refugee legal aid.

Two police officers are to be prosecuted for their involvement in a young activist's death in Alexandria on 6 June 2010 but the charges being brought against them do not include murder. The activist, Khaled Mohammed Said, was beaten to death outside an Internet café after being arrested by two plain-clothes police officers. His family and local human rights organisations say he had just posted a video online showing police officers sharing the proceeds from a drug deal.

The unanimous decision by five judges of the UK supreme court in favour of the appellants in HJ (Iran) and HT (Cameroon) v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2010] UKSC 31 represents a milestone in legal history. It secures the rights of LGBT people in need of protection from persecution, and will bring to an end years of discriminatory policy by the immigration services.

Tension over the future of Abyei, a flashpoint region roughly the size Lebanon on Sudan’s north-south border, erupted into armed violence and street demonstrations this week. On 5 July, gunmen mounted an attack near the village of Tajalei, about 30km northeast of Abyei town, killing five people, a police officer and four civilians.

The difficult past of Zambia's ambiguous role in Namibia's and Angola's freedom fight is haunting current President, thus Foreign Minister, Rupiah Banda. The 1970s anti-communist Zambian regime is said to have killed Namibian freedom fighters in agreement with apartheid South Africa and Sam Nujoma. Historians confirm the allegations.

According to the World Refugee Survey 2009 statistics, the five East African Community States host a combined population of 949,000 refugees. Of this number, about 300,000 are citizens of East African States living as refugees in the territory of other Community member States. As conflicts in traditional refugee-producing Community member states abate and their citizens return home, conflict in previously tranquil states like Kenya have injected more refugees into the Community pool.

The World Peace Academy - Swiss Center for Peace Studies in Basel, Switzerland (see is a young institution of higher learning, which offers a "Master of Advanced Studies in Peace and Conflict Transformation" in cooperation with the University of Basel since 1 March 2010. The World Peace Academy is looking for a Director of Studies (50-60%), beginning immediately or upon mutual agreement.

Fahamu Refugee Programme & UNHRC invites lawyers and legal advisors to a course aimed at arming them with the information, networks and resources they require to represent those accused of witchcraft. Participants will learn how to best represent those whose claims to asylum are based upon accusations of witchcraft, an emerging area of refugee law in which there is a need for specialised knowledge and training.

4-5 September 2010
Oxford, United Kingdom
Registration fee: £150
If you would like to attend, please submit a completed to Fahamu by 21 August 2010.

Fahamu’s Refugee Programme is pleased to announce the June edition of the , a monthly publication that aims to provide a forum for providers of refugee legal aid. With a focus on the global South, it aims to serve the needs of legal aid providers as well as raise awareness of refugee concerns among the wider readership of Pambazuka News.

The e-Newsletter follows recent developments in the interpretation of refugee law; case law precedents from other constituencies; reports and helpful resources for refugee legal aid NGOs; and stories of struggle and success in refugee legal aid work. It welcomes contributions from legal aid providers, refugees, and others interested or involved in refugee legal aid.

With rumours circulating that when the World Cup is over, foreigners will be expelled from South Africa, Glen Ashton asks whether xenophobia is the right word to describe the country’s attitude towards immigrants. ‘A close examination of purported xenophobic outbreaks of violence shines the spotlight on some of our most intractable problems, that of economic marginalisation’ writes Ashton. South Africa is dealing not with xenophobia, but the consequences of ‘poverty and the lack of progressive economic transformation since 1994’, Ashton argues.

‘Gerald Caplan is right to outline various deficiencies of Edward Herman and David Peterson’s chapter on Rwanda in their new book 'The Politics of Genocide'. In important ways, however, Caplan’s review piece actually contributes to the very phenomenon he is trying to attack,’ writes Oliver Kearns.

Responding to Gerald Caplan's

Ongoing clashes between various armed groups in western Sudan have intensified since May, displacing 725 households from Jebel Mara to Hassa Hissa camp in Zalingei, West Darfur, aid workers said. An inter-agency verification exercise, conducted on 27 June, followed an appeal by the joint UN-African Union peacekeeping mission in Darfur (UNAMID) to the parties in the conflict to cease hostilities. On 24 June, UNAMID reported casualties in clashes between the Rizeigat and Misseriya communities in Bugulay and Tereij villages, 28km southeast of Zalingei.

Tens of thousands of Congolese Tutsi refugees living in Rwanda for more than a decade are preparing to return to North Kivu province. But longstanding and unresolved tensions over land threaten to upset their homecoming. More than 53,000 registered refugees have been living across the border since the chaos surrounding the 1997 ousting of President Mobutu Sese Seko by Rwanda- and Uganda-backed rebels.

The Western Sahara conflict, notes analyst Yahia Zoubir, is now in the 35th year, with no sign of resolution. While the United Nations is ostensibly responsible for its resolution, France and the United States provide implicit support for Moroccan occupation of the territory, failing to support a referendum which might include the option of independence. The issue continues to poison relations between Algeria and Morocco, blocking hopes of regional economic integration in the Maghrib.

Squealing with delight, young Elvis rushes off to greet his mother as she wends her way towards the family's hut in north-eastern Botswana's Dukwi refugee camp. The Zimbabwean infant, aged almost three, is a picture of health. But one year ago, carrying the Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV), he was near death's door. Elvis could barely sit up. His body was wracked with opportunistic infections, including tuberculosis, and he was constantly in hospital for treatment.

Although the flow of Somali refugees into neighbouring countries has weakened, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) today cautioned that the Horn of Africa nation’s security and humanitarian situation continues to deteriorate. Compared to last year, the number of Somalis arriving in Kenya and Yemen – the two countries which have received the greatest number of Somali refugees – are down sharply.

Drive a few hours north-east of Khartoum towards Kassala, near the Sudanese border with Eritrea, and you will come across one of the UN refugee agency's most striking achievements in the region – acre after acre of trees, stretching into the distance. UNHCR has planted more than 19 million of them in a programme, launched a quarter-of-a-century ago, to green the denuded landscape of eastern Sudan. Species of acacia, neem, eucalyptus and many others, now cover almost 28,400 hectares of once barren land.