The Speaker of the National Assembly and Chairperson of the Southern African Development Community Parliamentary Forum, Ms. Ntlhoi Motsamai, says the forum is committed to the struggle for justice, democracy, gender equality and equity. The forum is also committed to the rule of law, sustainable development and ensuring good governance in the SADC region.

The Court of Appeal of Lesotho has granted an application by the Canadian engineering company Acres International for the suspension of payment of a R22-million fine imposed on the firm for bribing a senior official of the Lesotho Highlands Water Project.

Blue is normally my favorite color, but after my recent trip to Lesotho I will have to reconsider. The water I saw exiting two clothing manufacturing plants and entering nearby fields was the color of ink. A steady stream of this filth entered a space surrounded by cattle grazing, children playing, and adults interacting, turning the area into a cesspool. From this field, the refuse enters a nearby river, flowing first into South Africa and later into Namibia.

Lesotho’s Prime Minister, Pakalitha Mosisili says a multi-sectoral effort is needed and should be stepped up more than ever to fight the HIV/Aids pandemic. Lesotho’s HIV/Aids infection rate stands at 31% and is regarded as one of the highest in the southern African region.

Amid strides made countrywide to address the ever-escalating rate of HIV/Aids prevalence, the private sector, through the Private Sector Coalition Against HIV/Aids, has felt the need to fight the disease in the workplace.

The Lesotho Highlands Water Project has throttled wild rivers and drowned verdant valleys. Its concrete megadams have flooded out thatched huts, subsistence farms and grazing lands here in the impoverished mountain region known as the Roof of Africa. And now the project is embroiled in one of the biggest corruption scandals in the checkered history of African development.

A Canadian construction company, Acres International, has been fined £1.6m by a court in the southern African state of Lesotho for paying bribes in connection with the country's multi-billion pound dam project.

Negotiations are on a good track between the Lesotho Clothing and Allied Workers Union and the Exporters Association of Lesotho, despite earlier threats of a call for an industrial action.

In a landmark decision that has sweeping implications for Third World development, engineering multinational Acres International of Oakville, Ontario has been convicted by the Lesotho High Court in southern Africa on two counts of bribing a local official to secure contracts on a multibillion dollar dam scheme. Earlier this year, the recipient of the bribes, Lesotho's Masupha Sole, was also convicted.

HIV-positive people who know they have the virus and commit sexual offenses would be subject to the death penalty under a bill presented on Wednesday to the Lesotho Parliament by Refiloe Masemene, minister of justice, law and constitutional affairs in the Southern African nation.

Almost a third of Lesotho's population is infected with HIV/Aids, the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) in Maseru announced on Tuesday. The announcement was made during a workshop to determine how best to deal with HIV/Aids in the landlocked country.

The United Nations Children's Fund, UNICEF, said more than 440,000 people in the southern African country of Lesotho are at risk of starving, including about 62,000 children under age five. UNICEF has said Lesotho's problem is compounded by poverty and a high level of HIV/AIDS.

A former senior official in Lesotho found guilty of taking bribes from an international consortium of construction firms has been sentenced to 18 years in prison.

The prime minister of Lesotho took up his post on Tuesday following his party's victory in an election rejected by the opposition. At an inauguration ceremony boycotted by opposition parties, Pakalitha Mosisili pledged to fight HIV/Aids, the food shortage and massive unemployment.

In stark contrast to the regions most recent presidential election in Zimbabwe, Lesotho's May 25 poll has been described as a model for southern Africa and the continent. It was announced on Tuesday that the ruling Lesotho Congress for Democracy (LCD) had won an absolute majority, scooping 61 out of 120 parliamentary seats.

Acres International Ltd., one of the great names in Canadian engineering, is nearing the end of a criminal trial in an impoverished African kingdom on charges that could stain its reputation. Acres is accused of bribing the former head of one of Africa's biggest public projects, a system of dams and tunnels to divert water from Lesotho's mountains to thirsty South African cities and generate electricity in the process. Acres maintains it is innocent of bribery.

Lesotho has one of the highest HIV/AIDS infection rates in the world, yet prevention and treatment programmes are only just getting off the ground. UNAIDS associate country programme advisor Ludo Bok told PlusNews the impoverished mountain kingdom was still in the early stages of responding to the pandemic, but had a prevalence rate of between 31 and 34 percent.

With only a month to go before elections, Prime Minister Mosisili has finally conceded and officially announced a state of famine in the country, after numerous attempts of subsidies and counter productive initiatives to curb the serious threat of cereal crop deficit in Lesotho.

The POSITIVE ACTION Society in Lesotho, a small Mountain Kingdom in Southern Africa, is experiencing a dramatic increase in HIV/AIDS infection rates. Latest published figures show that over 42% of pregnant women in the capital Maseru are testing HIV positive and 65% of patients seeking treatment for Sexually Transmitted Infections are also testing HIV positive.

We at the POSITIVE ACTION Society are a group of infected and affected people trying to make a positive impact in regards of behavioural change and improving the living conditions for PLWHAs (People Living With HIV/AIDS). Within the last three years we have implemented various activities to achieve our goals with mixed successes. More and more PLWHAs want to join our group, which provides a conducive environment for infected and affected people, to assist us in our fight against the pandemic. Unfortunately whatever we do is not enough to significantly improve the debilitating impact the HI Virus causes to the lives of our people.

Please have a look at our web site and try to provide us with some ideas, advice, proven strategies etc. which can enable us to achieve a greater impact.

Hoping that you will find some time to assist us with advice, prayers or other support.

With Lesotho's elections set for 25 May the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) is focusing on conflict resolution initiatives to avoid a recurrence of the unrest that followed 1998's poll.