Ghana-based sub-regional press freedom body Media Foundation for West Africa (MFWA) has said that some students in Mali ransacked a private radio station, 'Radio Kayira', destroyed broadcasting equipment worth about FCFA 18 million approximately (US$3,571,950), and stole more than FCFA 2 million (about US$398,556) in cash.

The spy chief for South African police, Richard Mdluli, has been moved from his powerful post pending the outcome of an investigation against him, the police minister said Wednesday. Mdluli has been embroiled in controversy since he was charged with murder and corruption in 2011. The charges were provisionally withdrawn earlier this year and a court inquest opened. Police Minister Nathi Mthethwa told lawmakers that the inspector general of intelligence would further look into claims that Mdluli was spared a trial due to political meddling.

Tanzania will campaign for South African Home Affairs minister Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, who is seeking to become the next chairperson of the African Union Commission. But neighbouring Kenya has turned down a request from South Africa to support its candidate. When meeting with a South African delegation, President Mwai Kibaki said South Africa's ambition for the AU top job clashes with Kenya's own interest to have Erastus Mwencha, a Kenyan, for the post of deputy chairperson.

The policy prescriptions of the World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF) have failed to change the fundamentals of the economies of African countries and must be re-examined for the continent to develop, says a Professor of Law. 'The fundamentals remain unchanged. That the structure of African economies remains unchanged means that there will be no meaningful development,' Prof. Akilagpa Sawyerr, a member of the Council of State, said at the launch of 'The Oxford Companion to the Economics of Africa' in Accra.

The conviction of a prominent member of Equatorial Guinea’s beleaguered political opposition is a travesty of justice, Human Rights Watch said. A trial court in the city of Bata found Wenceslao Mansogo Alo, a medical doctor, guilty of professional negligence and sentenced him to three years in prison in a politically motivated trial.

'As we look forward to celebrating the 54th anniversary of Africa Liberation Day, we look back to its founding principles to assess and plan the onward progress of the African revolution.'

Though apartheid ended on paper, black South Africans in uMshwathi continue to struggle against being uprooted from farmlands by white land grabbers.

Mobile technologies, which play an increasingly important role in Africa’s education systems, are set to stimulate debate at this year’s eLearning Africa conference in Cotonou, Benin, from 23-25 May. Through a range of interactive expert-led sessions, participants at eLearning Africa 2012, the Continent’s leading conference on ICT for development, education and training, will explore the challenges, opportunities and success stories of mLearning.

The Burundi government has rejected a recent critical report by Human Rights Watch (HRW) on 'the escalation of violence in Burundi' describing it as 'a declaration of war'. A statement said: 'As the previous reports were seen by the Burundi government as simple signs of provocation, the one which came out on Wednesday 2 May...is a true declaration of war against the Burundi people bound, according to the NGO, to disappear if it continues to live with the leaders it elected in the last elections.'

Soldiers loyal to general Bosco Ntanganda have formed a new rebel movement called M23, civil society groups in eastern DR Congo said. The movement's name is in reference to the peace accord that was signed on March 23, 2009 and which enabled the rebels of the National Congress for the Defence of the People (CNDP) to be integrated into the DR Congo Armed Forces (FARDC). It is believed that Ntanganda and his associates formed this rebel movement to reposition themselves on the political scene once the institutions that are formed after the elections have been established.

On the one-year anniversary of the Fukushima nuclear disaster, Japanese women in New York City gathered for a rally they called Pregnant With Fear of Radiation. Protestors wore fake pregnant bellies, or carried posters with images of pregnant women wearing face masks. Well aware that fetuses, children under five, and women are at the greatest risk from radiation exposure, mothers have emerged as a powerful voice in Japan’s growing anti-nuclear movement. To call attention to their message, the mothers have organized marches, petitioned government officials, fasted, and held months-long sit-ins in public locations. They regularly wear symbols of maternity and motherhood in deliberately confrontational ways.

Egypt’s New Women Foundation said they are suing Islamist Parliament member Azza al-Garf over her pro-female genitals mutilation (FGM) statements. The women’s rights foundation sent a letter to the speaker of parliament Saad al-Katatny, informing him of legally going after Garf and asking for his permission to be allowed to take the MP to court. The parliament needs to lift immunity for an MP in order for them to be held accountable in a court of law.

The much anticipated reconciliation talks between President Alassane Ouattara’s ruling party coalition and opposition parties ended much like they began: with the party of former President Laurent Gbagbo, the Ivorian Popular Front (FPI), conditioning future engagement on the release of Laurent Gbagbo and the other former party leaders in detention. These preconditions not only expose the FPI political elite’s contempt for the thousands of victims of often heinous forms of political violence, but also reinforce the perception that the party remains more interested in hard-line politics than in helping end the root causes of the country’s grave human rights abuses.

'Beneath the rhetoric that GM is the key to feeding a hungry world, there is a very different story - a story of control and profit.'

Sending troops to Somalia will be seen as furthering the agenda of imperialists. The idea of Africans fighting Africans is abhorrent.

This global overview from the Norwegian Refugee Council’s Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre looks at internal displacement resulting from conflict and violence during 2011. 'In 2011, the number of people internally displaced by these causes stood at 26.4 million. The world in 2011 was an unsafe place for millions of people. From criminal violence including attacks by armed groups in sub-Saharan Africa or by drug cartels in Latin America, to armed clashes such as those associated with the conflict in Côte d’Ivoire or the uprisings across the Arab world: such events caused hundreds of thousands of people to flee their homes. Many risked their lives as they sought refuge in unfamiliar environments while facing a constant struggle to meet their basic needs.'

An independent United Nations expert has urged the Tunisian Government to ensure that human rights, especially the right to education, are kept at the heart of the historic reforms taking place in the North African nation. 'Tunisia is at a turning point in its history,' the UN Special Rapporteur on the right to education, Kishore Singh, stressed at the end of his first fact-finding mission to the country. 'If it fails to secure in its new Constitution and its new laws the highest standards of protection of human rights, particularly the right to education, Tunisia will miss a historic opportunity,' he added.

Ethiopia has made more than 4 million hectares (9.9 million acres) of 'fertile and unutilized' land available for agriculture companies that meet government requirements, Prime Minister Meles Zenawi said. About 300,000 hectares has been leased for commercial farming so far, he said at an Ethiopian investment forum in the capital, Addis Ababa.

Zambia's President Michael Sata has warned Western diplomats against meeting his country's opposition leaders, saying such acts amounted to meddling. 'We do not do it in Europe, and why should they do it here? I am therefore directing the minister of foreign affairs to address the issue of diplomats meddling in internal affairs of the country,' Sata said on state radio.

A drought is threatening Angola's already modest food production, in a setback for efforts to revive once-vibrant farmlands abandoned during decades of war. The dry season that normally lasts only about three weeks in December has stretched to three months in parts of the southern African country where most regions are used to abundant rainfall almost year-round. 'Production has collapsed throughout the central and southern regions,' said Belarmino Jelembi, national coordinator of the Association for Rural and Environmental Development.