In 2010 alone, global military spending rose to an all-time high amount of $1.63 trillion. The second annual Global Day of Action on Military Spending took place on 17 April 2012 to coincide with the release of the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute’s (SIPRI) new annual figures on world military expenditures.

Global foreign direct investment (FDI) outflows rose by 16 per cent in 2011 to an estimated US$1.66 trillion, surpassing the pre-crisis levels of 2007, UNCTAD’s latest Global Investment Trends Monitor reports. This growth was due in large part to cross-border mergers and acquisitions and to increased amounts of cash reserves kept in foreign affiliates, the Monitor, No. 9, says. The report notes that much-needed direct investment in new productive assets through greenfield investment projects or capital expenditures in existing foreign affiliates appeared to be limited.

Join more than 500 policymakers, activists and practitioners, including young persons, people living with HIV & AIDS, with disabilities, and LGBQTI persons from Africa and around the world at the 5th Africa Conference on Sexual Health and Rights. The conference will will take stock of responses to sexual health and rights on the continent since ICPD, and interrogate the status of sexual health and rights, with particular focus on women, girls, adolescents and youth.

A coalition of pressure groups has unveiled a new campaign against three controversial sponsors of the London Olympics, accusing them of using the Games to 'greenwash' unethical corporate activities. With the growing prospect of protests at the Games by groups seeking to highlight the activities of its corporate backers and others planning to use it as a broader canvas to protest against capitalism, the Greenwash Gold campaign marks a new level of co-ordination.

Julius Malema will continue to perform his duties as president of the ANC Youth League (ANCYL) despite his suspension by the ANC, the league has said. A previous meeting of the NEC resulted in a 'mandate to protect and defend the autonomy of the ANCYL by not agreeing with the removal or release of any of the elected leaders of the ANC Youth League until 2014'. The ANC’s national disciplinary committee suspended Malema for calling President Jacob Zuma a dictator.

Lawyers for Zambia's ex-president Rupiah Banda accused prosecutors Thursday of pursuing his son on politically motivated charges of corruption in the sale of the national telecom firm to Libya's LAP Green. Henry Banda is living in South Africa. After his father lost elections in September 2011 the elite Government Investigative Wing announced that he was wanted for questioning over the $257-million sale of fixed-line operator Zamtel to the Libyan firm.

Water privatisation has been proven not to help the poor, yet a quarter of all World Bank funding goes directly to corporations and the private sector, bypassing both governments and its own standards and transparency requirements in order to do so, says a new report. Corporate Accountability International, the US-based non-governmental organisation that published the report, has called on the World Bank to stop funding the private water sector and start redirecting its money to public and democratically accountable institutions.

The latest issue of the Mozambique Political Process Bulletin is available and deals with anti-corruption legislation.
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An ecological disaster of massive proportions is imminent in the Vaal River system because of the decision years ago not to implement the mining industry's proposal for the treatment of acid mine drainage. Government's own emergency plan to treat the acid water has resulted in the equivalent of 140 tonnes of salts being discharged into these rivers each day because of the decision to dump neutralised but sulphate-rich water into the rivers of the Western Basin.

Uganda’s dismal employment prospects have left more than 12 per cent of the population unemployed or underemployed. New college graduates say they can’t find long-term work or any work at all. In the face of unemployment and underemployment, many are sticking with jobs that underpay or conflict with personal values.

The detention and deportation of immigrants has reached an all-time high under the Obama administration. Al Jazeera's Fault Lines investigates the business of immigrant detention and finds out how a few companies are shaping US immigration laws.

On the day that biotech giant Monsanto released its second quarter earnings, a new report by civil society organisations showed that around the world small-holder and organic farmers, local communities and social movements are increasingly resisting and rejecting Monsanto, and the agro-industrial model that it represents. The new report, jointly produced by La Via Campesina, Friends of the Earth International and Combat Monsanto - available in English, French and Spanish - provides snapshots of frontline struggles against Monsanto and other agrochemical corporations pushing genetically modified (GM) crops onto farmers and into the environment.

Twelve of the world's poorest countries - including Afghanistan, Pakistan and seven nations in Africa - are going to be hit as the Conservative government looks to slash $377 million in foreign aid over the next three years, Postmedia News has learned. The exact impact on each country is unclear, but the cuts are expected to prompt anger and frustration from the affected countries, which rely on international assistance to provide food and other services to millions of citizens. A number had already seen major reductions three years ago.

The farmers' union TAU SA has voiced concern over the impact toll fees would have on food prices. Union president Louis Meintjes said farmers already have their backs against the wall with rising fuel prices and higher vehicle registration and licence fees. The additional burden of toll fees on Gauteng freeways would put farmers in an impossible position, he told Transport Minister Sbu Ndebele in a letter released to the media.

Mozambique is addressing its chronic skills shortages with a campaign to lure back more than 25,000 nationals living abroad, who fled the country during its deadly civil war. The country is also expanding its skills-training programmes, while hundreds of Mozambican students are in China attending technical training programmes.

Democracy campaigners in Swaziland have come up with a novel protest against King Mswati III - ignore the public holiday called to mark his birthday and go to work instead. The April 12 Swazi Uprising Movement is one of the many groups and individuals in Swaziland angered that King Mswati will be spending millions of emalangeni of public money on his birthday party. They want the Swazi people to boycott any celebration of his 44th birthday that falls on Thursday (19 April 2012).

The Immigration and Naturalisation Service (INS) in the Netherlands stands accused of being responsible for the suicide of a man who died trying to protect his children from deportation. Alain Hatungimana (36), an asylum seeker from Burundi, took his own life the day before he and his two children were due to be sent back to their homeland. According to friends in the Dutch town of Culemborg, Hatungimana had become very depressed as the deportation date drew near and he had told them his life would be in ruins if he returned to Burundi.

Teachers in Swaziland defied a government ban on their meeting and called a two-day strike. More than 300 members of the Swaziland National Association of Teachers (SNAT) met in Manzini where they decided to strike on 9 and 10 May 2012, to demand a 4.5 per cent salary increase.

A shortage of doctors and midwives in Cameroon has drawn more men into midwifery in recent years. While many Christian men and women say they prefer male midwives for their attentiveness, Muslim men and women say that it goes against their religion for a male to attend to a woman during labor. The government introduced the country’s first official midwife training program last year in order to ensure the availability of skilled midwives regardless of sex.

The April edition of the Peace and Security Council Report from the Institute of Security Studies has an article which focuses on the situation in Madagascar. 'Against the backdrop of serious obstacles in the process of implementing the Roadmap, the Malagasy military staged protests in March 2012 to air their grievances about poor living and working conditions,' notes the report. 'SADC’s failure to resolutely monitor and guarantee the implementation of the fragile Roadmap risks a relapse into violence in Madagascar,' it says later.