“In politics and sociology you reach a tipping point and once you’ve reached it, things change,” says Min-whee Kang of the UN Children's Fund. “This is what we’re aiming at to stop female genital mutilation and cutting in The Gambia.” But a strong attachment to the practice in the country means anti-FGM activists must combat the custom indirectly through focusing on improving girls' and women's health and education.

The Gambian Press Union (GPU) has in a statement issued on June 12, 2009 condemned President Yahya Jammeh’s deliberate attempt to vilifying Deyda Hydara, editor and a former critic of his repressive administration, brutally murdered in 2004 by unknown assailants, immediately after his newspaper celebrated its 13th anniversary.

Abdul Hamid Adiamoh, managing editor of Today, a privately-owned newspaper who has been in detention since his arrest on June 10, 2009 was on June 12 charged with “ publishing and broadcasting false information”, contrary to Section 181 (A) of the Criminal Code of the Gambia. Speaking with the pro-government Banjul-based Daily Observer newspaper, ASP Sulayman Secka, Public Relations Officer of the Gambia Police Force could not tell whether the journalist was still in police detention or not.

The ECOWAS Community Court in Abuja, Nigeria hearing the case of Musa Saidykhan, Gambian journalist allegedly tortured in custody of the National Intelligence Agency (NIA) will on June 30, 2009 give its ruling on preliminary objection raised by the Gambian government, the defendant in the case. After boycotting the court on two occasions, the Gambian government in a 20-page document called on the Community Court to dismiss Saidykhan’s case because it has no jurisdiction to hear the matter and that the plaintiff had also not exhausted all the local remedies.

Baba Leigh, Imam of Kanifing and outspoken critic of the President Yahya Jammeh’s administration was on May 22, 2009 warned by President Jammeh to stop criticizing the administration or risk going to prison. Media Foundation for West Africa (MFWA) sources reported that President Jammeh, who was addressing a rally in Kanifing castigated Leigh and accused him of misleading his followers and using his position as a religious leader to engage in money making ventures.

President Yahya Jammeh of Gambia has once again denounced homosexuality at a recent tour in Banjul, suggesting that the practice will not be tolerated in that country. The Gambian President made these remarks at the end of his People’s Tour held in Banjul at the Arch 22nd, an arch built to mark the rise of President Jammeh and his victory which put an end to the democratically elected government in Gambia in 1996.

Amina Saho-Ceesay, sitting at Banjul Magistrates' Court, has set 15 June for ruling on Point Newspaper's Managing Editor and Reuters correspondent, Pap Saine's matter, PANA was informed Thursday. According to reliable sources, the judgement date was fixed during the Wednesday session of the court after Saine's lawyers had urged the magistrate to “acquit and discharge” the journalist, arguing that the prosecution had failed to establish “a prima-facie case” and that Saine had “no case” to answer.

cc State-sanctioned witch-hunts in March have triggered growing popular criticism of Gambia’s repressive Jammeh government on the ground as well as internationally, writes Abena Ampofoa Asare. Detailing the failure of regional and continental mechanisms from the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights (ACHPR) to respond effectively to human-rights abuses in a deteriorating political situation, Asare calls for the issue to be addressed at the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights annual meeting on 13 May.

On 16 April 2009, Moses Ndene and Kebba Yorro Manneh, two sports journalists of privately-owned FM station City Limit Radio, were arrested and briefly detained by the Gambian police for allegedly criticising the administration of sports in the country.

Reporters Without Borders (RSF) has pleaded with the President of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) to meditate with the Gambian authorities in a case of a missing journalist, Ebrima Manneh since 2006. According to a letter from RSF addressed to Dr Mohamed Chambas, the president of ECOWAS, the president’s involvement will convince the Gambian leadership to shed light on the whereabouts of the missing journalist.

A prominent Gambian opposition figure arrested on 8 March and later charged with sedition and spying, was unconditionally released on Friday. Halifa Sallah is believed to have been arrested for articles he wrote for the main opposition newspaper Foroyya, which claimed that witch doctors accompanied by members of the army, police and the National Intelligence Agency (NIA) including “the green boys” - Gambian President Yahya Jammeh's personal protection guards - were identifying people as witches.

Arbitrary kidnappings and beatings of citizens in The Gambia, allegedly involving President Yaya Jammeh’s forces, signal a deterioration of human rights, says Amnesty International. Up to 1,000 people have been kidnapped by ‘witch doctors’ – from Guinea, rights activists say – since early February and taken to detention centres or to the President’s farm in Kanilai, accompanied by the President’s personal protection guards, the police and the army, according to an Amnesty International communiqué released on 18 March.

The Gambian court has freed opposition leader Halifa Sallah from jail with all the charges against him dropped. Mr Sallah who was arrested earlier this month, was charged with spying, sedition and holding illegal meetings. His release comes just a day after human rights organisation Amnesty International appealed for his release saying he was at risk of being tortured in jail also saying the country will not hold a fair trial for the man.

Editor of the daily The Point, Pap Saine, has had two trials in which he is facing charges adjourned to later in the month. In the first, before a court in Kanifing, near Banjul, on a charge of “publication and dissemination of false news”, the judge, Sainabou Wadda-Ceesay, ordered an adjournment until 23 March, because of the need to ensure the charges against the journalist conformed with a 2005 amendment to the criminal code.

Child protection Alliance in collaboration with United Nations Children Fund are making final arrangements towards the setting up of an Adolescent Neighborhood Watch Groups in five communities in the Greater Banjul Area, Gambia in a reinvigorated drive to tackle the immoral acts of sex tourists in the country.

Gambian authorities on Wednesday dragged Halifa Sallah, the detained opposition leader and publisher of pro-opposition Foroyaa Newspaper, before Brikama Magistrate’s Court on three-count charges relating to “sedition and spying,” authoritative sources in Banjul informed PANA. Sallah, a respected sociologist and leader of Gambia’s opposition coalition National Alliance for Democracy and Development (NADD), was later remanded at the “Mile Two Central Prison” on the outskirts of the capital.

The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) and its regional body the Federation of African Journalists (FAJ) has condemned the persistent intimidation of the editor and co- proprietor of the Point Newspaper, Pap Saine by the Gambian authorities.

The case against the Co-Publisher and Managing Editor of the Gambia's Point newspaper, Mr. Pap Saine, standing trial for alleged false publication and broadcasting was Thursday adjourned by Magistrate Sagarr Jahateh of the Kanifing Magistrate's Court to 25 February 2009 for hearing.

Gambia’s Information and Communication Department has been taken over by President Yahya Jammeh’s office while the newly-appointed Information Secretary (Minister) Omar Ndow has been redeployed, the government said in a statement received on Thursday.

Reporters Without Borders condemns the way the Gambian authorities continue to hound The Point, a privately-owned daily based in Banjul. Its editor, Pap Saine, was charged with publishing false information yesterday, two days after being arrested and then freed on bail for reporting the arrest of a Gambian diplomat. Saine is to appear in court again on 19 February.