An umbrella group representing various Christian churches in Nigeria said on Friday it had pulled out of peace talks with Muslims in the volatile northern Nigerian state of Kaduna after accusing Islamic militants of mounting a new spate of attacks on Christians across the north. For three years, the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) has been in government-backed talks with its Muslim counterpart, Jamatu’ul Nasir Islam (JNI) in Kaduna State in a bid to end the sectarian violence. More than 3,000 people have died in clashes in the state capital of Kaduna, since 2000.

A total of 450 principals, teachers, supervisors and invigilators have been blacklisted for aiding and abetting examination malpractice in some schools in the country. Also, 360 post-primary schools have lost recognition as examination centres.

A lawsuit for alleged libel has been filed with the Abuja High Court against The Sun Publishing Limited of Nigeria and its senior editors. The journalists named in the suit are Mike Awoyinfa, managing director and editor-in-chief, Louis Odion, editor of the "Sunday Sun", Femi Adesina, editor of "The Sun" daily and Steve Nwosu, editor of the "The Sun on Saturday". Chief Orji Uzor Kalu, the newspaper's publisher and the governor of Abia State, in southeastern Nigeria, was cited in the suit as the principal defendant. Chief Anthony Anenih, former works and housing minister and current chairman of the board of trustees of the ruling People's Democratic Party (PDP), filed the suit on 23 March 2004, claiming damages in the amount of five billion naira (approx. US$37 million). According to Media Foundation for West Africa-Nigeria, the lawsuit followed a series of reports published by the "Sun" about an allegation by Kalu saying that Anenih had threatened to give him "the Bola Ige treatment," which is a euphemism for assassination in a manner similar to that of Chief Bola Ige, the former justice minister, who was murdered two years ago.

The Nigerian authorities have banned local radio and television stations from relaying foreign news broadcasts live. This move has stopped the BBC from broadcasting news and programmes on FM in four Nigerian cities, depriving listeners across the country of a popular source of national and international news. The ban on live relay broadcasts was imposed by the government’s radio and television regulator, the National Broadcasting Commission (NBC), with effect from 1 April.

Anti-corruption campaigners have attacked the British government's financial support for a UK-based subsidiary of Halliburton that is part of a consortium under investigation over bribery allegations. The consortium is alleged to have paid $180m (?149m, £99m) in bribes to secure a construction project in Nigeria. In a letter to the UK's Department of Trade and Industry, a group of five pressure groups claims the British government failed to vet properly the consortium's work on a multi-billion dollar natural gas project under construction in the country.

Against the backdrop of last week's declaration by foreign affairs minister Olu Adeniyi that Nigeria has ratified the UN Anti Corruption Convention, Independent Advocacy Project (IAP), the good governance group, has urged the federal government to also ratify the African Union (AU) Convention on Preventing and Combating Corruption which was adopted last July in Maputo, Mozambique by African Heads of State. While describing the ratification of the UN Convention as a significant development, IAP in a statement released in Lagos points out that both the UN and the AU Conventions are useful instruments and that one should not be ratified to the neglect of the other.

Nigeria's ruling People Democratic Party (PDP) has won a sweeping victory in local elections during which almost 50 people died. President Olusegun Obasanjo's party now controls almost all levels of government across the country. The local elections were marred with claims of massive rigging and recorded a very low turn out.

Nigeria's president has warned that Lake Chad will soon disappear unless immediate action is taken. Olusegun Obasanjo said the shrinking water levels were threatening the livelihood of more than 20 million people in the region.

Nigeria’s northern Zamfara State ended its boycott of a global polio immunisation programme, amid reports of new cases of the crippling disease in previously polio-free zones. Nigerian state radio announced on Saturday that the overwhelmingly Muslim state sent its volunteers for training ahead of a new national round of immunisation beginning on Monday.

Every time Stephen Yibo goes fishing around the U.S.-operated oil platform near his village in Nigeria's southern delta, soldiers come out on boats and shoot into the air to scare him away. Yibo, 25, says oil could be used to bring health and education to Fishtown, a poverty-stricken village of wood and thatch huts which has been abandoned by the government. Instead, he reels off a list of what he believes are unfulfilled promises of the oil company ChevronTexaco.

The Minister of State for Finance, Mrs. Nenadi Usman, has alleged that about 30 per cent of the corruption in the public service is traceable to the Nigeria Customs Service. She also accused officers of the service of contributing to the closure of many manufacturing companies in the country. Usman said if the service could be reformed the larger part of the ongoing economic reforms embarked upon by President Olusegun Obasanjo would have been done.

The World Bank President James Wolfensohn has urged President Olusegun Obasanjo to intensify the war on corruption and build a judicial system which would protect peoples rights. Speaking at a joint press briefing with President Obasanjo after a brief meeting, the World Bank boss said a clean financial system and an independent judiciary was essential to the success of the ongoing reforms in government.

Nigerian troops have denied a claim by an activist group that they opened fire last week on unarmed villagers near the southern oil town of Warri, killing at least 51 people, hours after a soldier was killed in a clash with an armed gang. The Federated Niger Delta Ijaw Communities (FNDIC) group said in a statement on Saturday that 10 women, 19 children and 20 men were initially counted dead in the alleged 9 March dawn attack on Fenegbene by members of a special military task force stationed in the volatile region.

Nigerians in Diaspora Organisation - Europe (NIDOE) is organising a two-day conference aimed at mobilising the significant Nigerian diaspora in support of development efforts in Nigeria.

The Nigerian Senate is seeking to improve the country's rating by the corruption watchdog Transparency International, said a senior Senate official in Lagos last Wednesday. Chairman of the Senate's Anti-Corruption Committee Bemisola Saraki told local media in the Nigerian commercial centre Lagos that the legislative chamber is worried by Transparency International's classification of the country as the second most corrupt nation in the world.

Nigeria’s programme of subsidised antiretroviral treatment, interrupted since September last year by drug shortages, has resumed with the arrival of emergency supplies ordered by the government, health officials said on Friday. Ayo Osinlu, spokesman for the Minister of Health Eyitayo Lambo, said drugs worth 500 million naira [about US $3.8 million] ordered by the government in January began arriving in Nigeria two weeks ago.

One of the main promises of the Obasanjo administration when it kicked off in 1999 was to fight corruption. One of the first bills presented to the National Assembly was the Independent Corrupt Practices (and Other Related Offences) Bill. The bill was duly passed. Many human rights activists condemned that Act which was considered too harsh. They argued that the law could be a potent weapon for a dictator to hunt the opposition. On the other hand, the President and the ruling party argued that existing law had too many loopholes which offenders were exploring to escape punishment. Four years after, Nigeria is still deemed the most corrupt country in the world.

At least 2,500 people have fled Plateau State in central Nigeria following a fortnight of violence between Muslims and Christians that has left 62 dead and more injured, the Red Cross said last Thursday. Patrick Bawa, a spokesman for the Red Cross in Nigeria, told IRIN that his organisation had registered 2,500 displaced people in neighbouring Bauchi State by Wednesday afternoon and more were still arriving.

The idea of an International Women's Day first arose at the turn of the century, which in the industrialized world was a period of expansion and turbulence, booming population growth and radical ideologies. International Women's Day has assumed a new global dimension for women in developed and developing countries alike. The growing international women's movement, which has been strengthened by four global United Nations women's conferences, has helped make the commemoration a rallying point for coordinated efforts to demand women's rights and participation in the political and economic process. Increasingly, International Women's Day is a time to reflect on progress made, to call for change and to celebrate acts of courage and determination by ordinary women who have played an extraordinary role in the history of women's rights.

An electoral official in central Nigeria has been shot dead by gunmen, police said on Monday, in the latest suspected politically motivated attack ahead of municipal elections later this month. The death of Philip Olurunipa, head of the Kogi State Electoral Commission, on Sunday triggered a riot in his home town of Kabba where the house of one of the suspected killers was set ablaze, police said.