'The Observatory for the Protection of Human Rights Defenders, a joint programme of the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) and the World Organisation Against Torture (OMCT), strongly condemns the continuing detention of at least fourteen human rights defenders and call upon the Government of Sudan to release them immediately as their detention is arbitrary.'

In the wake of protests in Tanzania and Tunisia and the authorities’ heavy-handed response, Kate Bomz draws parallels between the countries’ respective histories.

Thousands of children who have fled violence in Ivory Coast are at risk of sexual exploitation or recruitment by armed forces, aid workers warned on Tuesday. They are particularly concerned about children who have become separated from their parents during the turmoil following the country’s disputed presidential elections in November. About 30,000 people, more than 75 per cent of whom are women and children, have crossed the border into neighbouring Liberia while another 18,000 are internally displaced in Ivory Coast.

South Sudan has appealed for investors to plough $140 million into its war-hit wildlife parks, seeking to kick-start a tourism industry and wean itself off oil months ahead of its expected independence. The south has the world's second largest migration of mammals, untamed wildernesses and vast herds of gazelles and antelopes, rivalling anything seen in Kenya, Uganda and other African holiday hotspots, say experts.

The Zimbabwe Human Rights NGO Forum (the Forum) says it welcomes the judgment handed down by the Southern African Development Community (SADC) Tribunal on 9 December 2010 in the case of Gondo and eight others vs the Government of Zimbabwe. The SADC Tribunal ruled that the Government of Zimbabwe violated Articles 4 (c) and 6 (1) of the SADC Treaty by failing to pay compensation to the nine (9) Applicants who are all victims of organised violence and torture (OVT). 'The ruling also confirms what the Forum and other Zimbabwean civil society orgnisations have been saying over the years – that one of the country’s main challenges is the flagrant disregard of court orders by the state and the absence of the rule of law.'

Human Rights Watch has called on Saudi Arabia to stop the deportation of Somali refugees back to the war-torn Horn of Africa nation, reports Bloomberg. Saudi authorities sent more than 150 people back to the Somalia capital, Mogadishu, on 17 December, HRW said, citing local press reports. Another 2,000 were returned in June and July, according to the United Nations.

The Human Rights League of the Horn of Africa (HRLHA) is highly concerned about the safety of nine Oromo refugees from Ethiopia whose whereabouts are not known since they were extra-judicially arrested and taken away by members of the Djibouti force in Djibouti on different occasions in the months of November and December 2010, and January 2011. HRLHA has a profound belief that the two countries – Djibouti and Ethiopia – are acting jointly in hunting, arresting and punishing alleged members and/or supporters of opposition political organisations and human rights activists.

Two South African groups have launched a move to get an arrest warrant issued against Tzipi Livni, the chairperson of Israel's Kadima party, during a visit to the country next week, Israeli media have said. Haaretz.com, quoting Channel 10, said the Media Review Network (MRN) and the Palestine Solidarity Alliance (PSA) allege Livni committed war crimes in her role in Israel's three-week war on Gaza in late 2008-2009. Livni was then foreign minister in the government of Ehud Olmert.

As the International Criminal Court (ICC) decides whether to charge six prominent Kenyans over the violence that followed the 2007 presidential election, internally displaced persons (IDPs) have expressed concern over their much-delayed resettlement. 'We feel we have been suffering in camps for too long; we wonder if those who caused us the displacement ever think of our welfare,' Peter Kariuki, an IDP at the Mawingo camp in Nyandarwa district, Central Province, told IRIN.

Ivoirians are still crossing from western Côte d'Ivoire into Liberia at a rate of 400 to 600 a day, according to an 'initial refugee assessment' issued by the UN World Food Programme (WFP). Using data drawn from a four-day mission to Liberia border areas earlier this month, the WFP's study on the Ivoirian refugee influx and food security notes that 'refugee consumption is inadequate' and highlights the need for refugees to receive either full food rations or partial rations complemented by supplementary feeding.

Relative calm returned to western Zambia Saturday though under heavy police patrols after Friday’s bloody protests left two people killed and nine wounded as activists pressed for secession of the region. Police shot dead two youths in an effort to crush Barotseland activists who wanted to hold a rally at Limulunga royal village in Mongu – about 600 kilometres west of the capital Lusaka – to discuss secession of the province.

Saferworld and the Africa Peace Forum are delighted to invite you to the report launch of China’s Growing Role in African Peace and Security. China is increasingly coming to play a larger role in Africa’s peace and security landscape. This event provides an opportunity for a panel of speakers to present their own views and perspectives on the topic.

Several Cabinet Minister have left Kenya on a mission to countries around Africa to lobby support ahead of the tabling of a Motion before the African Union (AU), to push for Kenya's withdrawal from the International Criminal Court statute. The AU meeting will take place between 30 and 31 January in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. The Union has already urged for a deferment of Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir's indictment by the ICC and could undoubtedly back Kenya's bid.

Around 60 Banyamulenge refugees have been victims of torture and ‘cruel treatment by the Ethiopian police’ and ‘illegally detained with no reasons’, writes Akim M. Hakiza, in to uphold its commitments to refugees under international law.

The past year has seen mixed fortunes for activists working towards abolishing the death penalty in Africa. Togo and Burundi joined the ranks of African states that have removed capital punishment from their statutes, while Gambia extended its application to new offences. In April, Nigerian state governors announced they wished to see executions resumed 'as a measure to decongest prisons' and directed prison authorities to initiate execution papers.

Last week marked the first anniversary of the magnitude 7.0 earthquake that devastated the impoverished Caribbean nation of Haiti, leaving a quarter of a million of its people dead, more than 300,000 injured, and approximately a million and a half homeless. One year after this natural disaster, the horrors facing Haiti’s population have only deepened, with a cholera epidemic claiming thousands of lives and a million left stranded in squalid tent camps.

During the night of Wednesday, 5 January, young people took to the streets in the Algiers neighborhoods of Bab El Oued, Climat de France and Rais Hamidou to shout their anger at a socio-economic situation characterised by a high cost of living and unprecedented misery in such a rich country. Several other cities in the country also saw rioting, especially Oran, located west of Algiers, where young people ransacked several public buildings. The riots continued in other towns: Akbou and Tazmalt in Kabylie. This post from Global Voices contains links to commentary from bloggers about the protests, and a video showing some of the protest action.

A YouTube video is currently creating a stir among the Ivorian online community, reports Global Voices. It shows militaries beating up prisoners in the 'Maison d'Arrêt et de Correction' prison (MACA). According to the person who posted the video, the prisoners are Alassane Ouattara's partisans. Since the beginning of the political crisis in Ivory Coast, dozens of people have been arrested in Abidjan for their political opinion, and jailed at the MACA.

Yunis Egbaguru still lives in fear after she fled her village in south Sudan following an attack last month by the brutal Lord's Resistance Army, but she hopes an independent south will better protect her. Known for abducting young girls to serve as sex slaves and young boys to fight, the LRA fought Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni's government from neighbouring Sudan's lawless south for nearly 20 years until 2005, when it was ejected from its bases and forced on the move.

The results of this year’s SA Reconciliation Barometer survey, conducted by the Institute for Justice and Reconciliation (IJR), found that a majority of South Africans still agree that they are trying to forgive those who hurt them during apartheid. Close to three-quarters feel that they want to leave the past behind and move forward with their lives. However, writes Kate Lefko-Everett, the 2010 survey results also reveal some enduring concerns about the delivery of justice that pose challenges to further reconciliation, particularly in a context in which experts, analysts and practitioners have begun to question whether the wounds and traumas inflicted under apartheid may prove to outlast political will to help them heal.