The Council for the Development of Social Science Research in Africa (CODESRIA) is pleased to announce its Small Grants Programme for Thesis Writing for the year 2012. The grants serve as part of the Council’s contribution to the development of the social sciences in Africa, and the continuous renewal and strengthening of research capacities in African universities, through the funding of primary research conducted by postgraduate students and professionals.

Thirty per cent of threatened species are at risk because of consumption in developed world according to research made by University of Sydney. The study mapped the world economy to trace the global trade of goods implicated in biodiversity loss such as coffee, cocoa, and lumber. Years of data collection and thousands of hours on a supercomputer to process, lead to these global supply chains in amazing detail for the first time. The study evaluated over five billion supply chains connecting consumers to over 15,000 commodities produced in 187 countries. This was cross-referenced with a global register of 25,000 endangered and vulnerable species.

Sudanese refugees have started dying as a camp in South Sudan ran out of water four days ago after a massive influx of people fled across the border to escape war and hunger. The refugees are fleeing Sudan’s Blue Nile state where insurgents are fighting to overthrow the Sudanese government.

The Writers in Prison Committee (WiPC) of PEN International is extremely concerned about the condition and whereabouts of the Sudanese poet Abdelmoniem Rahma, who was arrested on 2 September 2011 in Blue Nile State, Sudan. He was reportedly tried in a military court in November and there have been alarming reports that he has since been sentenced to death. It is unclear, however, on what charges he has been convicted.

There are an estimated 3.3m migrant workers from other SADC countries in South Africa, between them sending around R11.2 billion rand home each year – R7.6 bn of which is estimated to flow through informal channels such as sending cash with a bus or taxi driver. The sheer volume of cross-border remittance flows and the large proportion sent informally indicates not only an untapped market opportunity for the formal sector to capitalize on, but also a strong policy imperative to reduce access barriers to the formal financial system for migrant workers and facilitate formalization of cross-border remittances. These are the high-level findings of a recent study commissioned by FinMark Trust and conducted by DNA Economics.

As of the end of 2011, more than 26 million people were internally displaced by conflict and violence across the world. More than a third of them were in Africa. A new publication from the Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre says that in a number of African countries, IDPs live in protracted displacement; their process of finding a durable solution has stalled, often leaving their rights unprotected and their communities marginalised.

After killing a man in self-defense, Benson turned himself in to Malawi's police. More than two years later, he was still waiting for a court hearing, while his body showed the scars from the long wait in Lilongwe's main prison. The Open Society Justice Initiative is spearheading a Global Campaign for Pretrial Justice, documenting the costs of excessive and unnecessary pretrial detention. Watch Benson's story in the video accessible through the link provided.

Despite marked improvements, numerous grievances that plunged Liberia into bloody wars from 1989 until President Charles Taylor left in August 2003 (originally for exile in Nigeria) remain evident, says this briefing from the International Crisis Group. These include a polarised society and political system; corruption, nepotism and impunity.

The latest issue of the South Bulletin focuses on the Rio Plus 20 Summit to be held in 20-22 June in Brazil. The meetings actually begin on 13 June. Twenty years after the Earth Summit the world faces even more serious crises in the environment and the economy. Will Rio+20 do better in rising to the challenge of tackling the global crises?

Formidable social and economic challenges threaten to undermine – or even halt – progress in Tunisia, despite the country’s positive transition to democracy. 'Tunisia: Confronting Social and Economic Challenges', the latest International Crisis Group report, shines a spotlight on the economic problems that largely were at the root of Tunisia’s uprising and that remain unresolved in its aftermath: rising unemployment, stark regional inequalities, smuggling and corruption.

The parliament in Burkina Faso has granted amnesty to President Blaise Compaore and all of the country's previous heads of state. The immunity from prosecution will cover all presidents since independence from France in 1960. President Compaore came to power in a 1987 coup in which popular leader Thomas Sankara was killed.

On 28 May 2012, a group of organisations wrote to the South African Human Rights Commission (SAHRC) to request that it urgently investigate the state of health and health care service provision at Lindela Repatriation Centre (Lindela). Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), SECTION27, Lawyers for Human Rights (LHR), and People against Suffering, Oppression and Poverty (PASSOP) requested a response from the SAHRC by 11 June 2012. To date, they have not received a response. Recent reports of violent protests within Lindela add even further urgency and credence to the request and the need to ensure that health and health rights are protected. Therefore, the organisations are now making the request public.

The Japanese government is bowing to pressures of the nuclear lobby in Japan.

Jennifer Abalo struggles to support two of her own and two of her late sister's children. She lost her father, sister and two of her children to Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) violence between 1998 and 2004, but like thousands of other victims she has never received any compensation, despite government promises. In 2010 Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni promised monetary compensation to 10,000 victims of the two-decade-long war between the LRA and the government.

Burundi has announced the setting up of a committee to investigate alleged cases of extra-judicial executions in the country. Public prosecutor Valentin Bagorikunda announced that a committe of six magistrates of the Public prosecutor's office would investigate allegations made over the past few months by national and international human rights organizations.

Isaac Mangena, in this opinion piece, assesses the political in and outs of Toyko Sexwale and his apparent bid to take the top spot of the ruling ANC from Jacob Zuma. 'Sexwale is not tainted much, and perhaps that’s why he is hated and not trusted so much inside the ANC than he is outside it. Unlike our current president, Sexwale is not exposed and his wealth make him less susceptible to corruption.'

A meeting of the Democratic Left Front (DLF) in South Africa discussed a proposed youth wage subsidy, the crisis of democracy, organising women and building the movement.

Local Egyptian reports mentioned on Monday 11 June the dreadful progress in the case of the Islamist parliamentarian whom police have accused of public indecency, as the girl in the case has been detained for four days under orders by the prosecutor. A report said that the prosecutor has also ordered a 'virginity test' on her to determine if she is a virgin or not. The news has caused an uproar among the rights community over the virginity tests, which brought back to mind the same tests that were forced upon female protesters in Tahrir Square in March 2011.

South African President Jacob Zuma has fired his police chief, who is implicated in suspect property deals, and replaced him with first woman head of the scandal-tarnished service. Zuma removed controversial police commissioner Bheki Cele from the post after a commission of enquiry found him 'unfit for office' over leases for police offices at far above market rates. Ms Mangwashi Phiyega was appointed the new national police commissioner with immediate effect. A technocrat with considerable management experience, she has been a trustee of Nelson Mandela's foundation and an executive at Barclays-owned banking group Absa.

This article from the Oxford Monitor of Forced Migration explores the ways in which Eritrean asylum-seekers in Israel narrate their experiences of suffering. These narrators were held hostage in the borderlands of the Northern Sinai desert by human traffickers for indefinite periods of time en route to Israel. Numerous Eritrean asylum-seekers experience and bear witness to torture, kidnapping, extortion, rape, and organ removal during the journey.