Attempts by President Robert Mugabe and his top aides to wrest control of controversial diamond fields in eastern Zimbabwe could have serious consequences for the peace and stability of the country, a report by a leading human rights group said on Monday.

Partnership Africa Canada (PAC) has issued a call for the release from detention of human rights activist, Farai Maguwu, and the suspension of Zimbabwe from the Kimberley Process.

It is a sign of the times that the second-largest cross-border acquisition by an Indian company involves Africa. The Bharti Airtel deal of $10.7 billion to acquire most of Zain Africa is, first, a measure of the changing footprint of global finance. Second, given that the African continent is being heralded as the global economy’s next frontier, the deal is an important chapter in the evolutionary narrative of India and Africa, which has lately been getting overshadowed by China’s presence in the continent.

Desertification is the persistent degradation of dryland ecosystems by human activities and climatic variations. Because of its toll on human well-being and on the environment, it ranks among the greatest development challenges of our times. The World Day to Combat Desertification focuses international attention on this growing problem. It has been observed each 17 June since 1995, the same year the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD) was iimplemented

A High Court judge has reserved judgement on the Kalahari Bushmen’s bid to gain access to a borehole which they rely on for water. The Bushmen were at the Botswana High Court to hear their application for permission to use their borehole which the Botswana government has banned them from using.

Scores of infants in northern Nigeria could be left with long-term neurological damage from lead poisoning caused by illegal gold mining which has already killed at least 170, most of them under five. Authorities in the state of Zamfara, aided by international agencies including Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF), the World Health Organisation and the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), are helping treat the sick and bury mines to try to contain the pollution before heavy rains due next month

Civil society groups attending a meeting on climate change in Bonn, Germany, have expressed disappointment that Saudi Arabia had blocked a review on the discussion of limiting temperature rise to 1.5 degrees Celsius target as suggested by scientists. "Many civil society groups are also disappointed to see discussions of the gigat on gap, the gap between pledged reductions and what is scientifically necessary, gone missing from the talks,' said Bill McKibben, founder of 350.org, an international climate campaign that has rallied millions of citizens in support of a science-based climate treaty.

World Environment Day, commemorated on 5 June since 1972, is one of the ways in which the United Nations focuses world attention on the environment and encourages political action. Since its inception, hundreds of thousands of people from countries all over the world have mobilized for individual and organized environmental action. Activities involve all sectors of society – governments, non- and inter-governmental organizations, businesses, industries, civil society, media and schools.

South Africa, where the FIFA Football World Cup is to kick off Jun. 11, has introduced cleaner transportation, while Brazil is planning ecological stadiums for the championship it will host in 2014. But these and other initiatives clash with the countries' overall environmental performance. The first FIFA (International Federation of Association Football) World Cup to take place on the African continent will leave a carbon footprint more than eight times greater than the 2006 World Cup in Germany, according to a study conducted in February 2009 at the request of the South African government and the Norwegian embassy in that country.

Kalahari Bushmen are taking the government of Botswana to court over its refusal to allow them access to a water borehole on their land. The case is due to be heard at Botswana’s High Court in Lobatse on 9 June 2010.

The Deepwater Horizon disaster caused headlines around the world, yet the people who live in the Niger delta have had to live with environmental catastrophes for decades

On the heels of winning a $3.75 million loan from the World Bank, South African utility Eskom is now seeking carbon credits from the Kyoto Protocol's Clean Development Mechanism. Environmentalists are outraged that one of the largest coal plants in the world could receive public funds from both the World Bank and the CDM.

Dutch prosecutors have accused multi-national oil trading firm Trafigura of illegally exporting hazardous waste to Ivory Coast in 2006. The allegations came at the start of a trial in which the firm is accused of breaking Dutch export and environmental laws and forging official documents. Tens of thousands of people in Ivory Coast said the waste made them ill.

The World People's Movement demands that United Nations climate change negotiations be inclusive, transparent, and equitable, and include the proposal expressed by the World People's Conference on Climate Change and the Rights of Mother Earth (Cochabamba, Bolivia, April 20–22).

A Climate Council, charged with developing a National Climate Plan, has been inaugurated by the Republic of Gabon's President Ali Bongo Ondimba. During the launch, President Ali Bongo Ondimba explained that the Climate Council was set up to recommend ways in which to develop the nation sustainably while combating climate change and preventing species loss.

A new ClimateWire article looks into the growing number of voices concerned about the World Bank's role in a post-Copenhagen world. The Bank's recent approval of a controversial loan to South African utility Eskom has spurred several previously reserved groups to demand reforms. BIC board member David Hunter was quoted.

Hundreds of bodies buried in a mudslide in Uganda three months ago have yet to be recovered, the rescue team says. Three villages on the slopes of Mount Elgon, near the eastern town of Bududa, were swept away in mudslide. About 200 people are still unaccounted for, while around 100 bodies have been recovered, officials say.

Zimbabwe has banned all exports of diamonds until a monitor from the Kimberley Process regulator approves the sale of gems from a field plagued by human rights abuses, the mines minister said Thursday. "I have suspended all diamond exports from Zimbabwe with immediate effect until the issue of Kimberley Process certification scheme has been sorted out," mines minister Obert Mpofu said in the state-run Herald newspaper.

Large-scale farming of the biodiesel jatropha tree should be stopped since it creates a food shortage. It will harm the environment and is of little commercial value, according to a national research institution. This comes as the country gears up for what could be the biggest jatropha biodiesel project in the region. An Italian company, Nouve Iniziative Industriali sri, is clearing 55,000 hectares leased from the Malindi County Council for the jatropha plantations.

As Ghana awaits the first riches from one of Africa’s top oil finds of the decade, expectations on the street are high and rising. “I believe in the oil,” said grocery vendor Grace Asantewaa from behind her meagre stall of tomatoes and chilli peppers at the Agbogbloshie market in the capital Accra. “We are sure everything will change in the name of Jesus,” predicted the 36-year-old mother-of-two, echoing widespread dreams of a more comfortable life once production from the Jubilee offshore field gets going in December this year.