The NamRights 2010 human rights report for Namibia notes that experience has 'strongly shown' that a systematic disregard for the democracy, human rights and good governance principles, rather than the absence of the law, constitutes 'the biggest root cause of the multitude of the interrelated, intertwined and interdependent civil, cultural, economic, environmental, political and social problems afflicting the Namibian people.' The report covers the period between 10 December 2009 and 10 December 2010. However, it is only an interim report deliberately released for the purposes of marking the 62nd Anniversary of the adoption of the United Nations’ Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR).

Thousands of people who fled a 24 November rebel attack in the northeastern Central African Republic (CAR) town of Birao, Vakaga Province, urgently need humanitarian assistance, says a UN official. 'The whole population, about 8,000, stayed a week in the bush, with no access to drinkable water, no protection from mosquitoes...' said Jean-Sébastien Munie, head of the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), in the CAR.

Human Rights Watch (HRW) has expressed concern that Zambian President Rupiah Banda invited indicted Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir to participate in a regional conference scheduled for 15 December. Group spokesman Reed Brody said a majority of human rights groups across Africa have expressed displeasure over the invitation. 'We are hoping that this report is not correct and, if it is, we are hoping that the president of Zambia will eventually think better of it.'

The Kenyan government should immediately stop deporting Somali nationals to war-torn Somalia and make a public commitment to protect and help them, Human Rights Watch has said. The Kenyan authorities deported almost 300 Somalis to south-central Somalia on 15, 29 and 30 November 2010, in violation of international law. Credible sources and witnesses to the deportations on 29 and 30 November told Human Rights Watch that police in the Kenyan border town of Liboi used pickup trucks to drive 130 Somali asylum seekers back to the Somali border.

In early 2010, unresolved conflicts and simmering tensions between different social and ethnic groups led to renewed displacement in the city of Jos in the heart of the 'middle belt' region of Nigeria. As in the rest of the country, no clear figures on the number of internally displaced people (IDPs) were available for this latest incident of violence. Ad-hoc local registration exercises have hinted at the scale of displacement, but many people sought shelter and support from family and friends and so were not counted, says a December report form the Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre.

At least 30 people have been killed in Morroco following torrential rain and floods. The dead included 24 people who were killed on Tuesday after their bus fell into a flooded river near Bouznika city, 40km south of the capital Rabat, police and the official MAP news agency said.

The process of statement taking from security chiefs has been suspended, meaning the Kenya chaos case will now be filed without their testimony. Judge Kalpana Rawal put the process on hold Tuesday to await the outcome of an application filed by the security bosses' lawyers at The Hague. The lawyers want assurances from the ICC that any evidence provided by their clients will not be used against them as the court's prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo puts together his case on post election violence.

Award-winning South African author Annelie Botes recently revealed in an interview with the Rapport newspaper that she dislikes and fears black South Africans. Her comments have sparked outrage and debate. Commentaries like 'Hands off Annelie Botes' by Andile Mngxitama (http://www.mg.co.za/article/2010-12-01-hands-off-anneli-botes) and 'Hiding in a Cave' by Pierre De Vos (http://constitutionallyspeaking.co.za/hiding-in-a-cave/) have led to a discussion about race and racism in the country.

A report into conditions at the De Doorns safety camp, set up to house victims of xenophobic violence in the Western Cape town, has found that conditions did not meet international guidelines for disaster victims. 'Too often have the narratives surrounding the xenophobic attacks in De Doorns centred around the causes of the attacks, which has inadvertently lent some legitimacy to the an underlying opinion that xenophobic violence is justified in some cases, for some causes. This, in turn, seems to have given rise to the sentiment that the victims of these xenophobic attacks are not entitled to the same rights and assistance as other disaster victims.'

Sudan's army has said that rebel leader Minni Minnawi's Sudan Liberation Army (SLA) - the only Darfur insurgent group to sign a peace deal with Khartoum - is now a military target. Any clashes between the army and the SLA would be a severe major blow to Darfur's stalling peace process, with other rebel groups sceptical of Khartoum's willingness to honour any accord they may sign.

The 31 December deadline for Zimbabwean immigrants to apply for the necessary permits to allow them to stay in the country will not be extended, Home Affairs Minister Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma has said. Zimbabweans in South Africa who attempted to register for business, study or work permits after the deadline would not be processed, she said, speaking in Pretoria after meeting representatives of the Zimbabwe Stakeholder Forum.

The United States is worried about a 'considerable deterioration' in press and other freedoms in Madagascar. A sharply worded critique by the US Embassy expressed concern about 'the constant harassment of political dissidents and journalists' on the Indian Ocean island. The statement also referred to reports of arbitrary arrests and mistreatment of suspects linked to a failed military mutiny last month.

Compelling new evidence suggests the Nigerian military killed four Ogoni elders whose murders led to the execution of the playwright and activist Ken Saro-Wiwa in 1995. The evidence also reveals that the notorious military commander Lieutenant-Colonel Paul Okuntimo, whose troops were implicated in murder and rape, was in the pay of Shell at the time of the killings and was driven around in a Shell vehicle.

In an interview with The Africa Report, the founder of the Niger Delta People’s Volunteer Force. explains why the Niger Delta's troubles remain central to Nigeria's politics. 'The NDPVF was formed after the 2003 elections when the government threatened that they wanted me dead because of my views. I had offered to be a witness at Muhammadu Buhari’s election tribunal hearing. They were shocked that as close as I was to Odili, I would be willing to give evidence against his party’s conduct of the 2003 election in Rivers State.'

Kenya is likely to witness worsening food security, significant disease outbreaks, and further pockets of conflict in 2011, as well as a continuing flow of refugees from Somalia, say aid officials. 'There is a fear of La Niña compromising the [food security] gains made,' said Aeneas Chuma, the UN Resident and Humanitarian Coordinator at the 30 November launch of Kenya’s 2011 Emergency Humanitarian Response Plan (EHRP) appeal. Most of the US$525 million funding requested is expected to meet food security and refugee needs.

Ten years after the signing of an accord designed to move Burundi from civil war to democratic stability, the country has yet to establish transitional justice mechanisms aimed at enhancing reconciliation and bringing to book those responsible for crimes committed during the country's turbulent years. Human rights activists and political observers say the lack of these mechanisms - a truth and reconciliation commission and some form of criminal tribunal - had perpetuated a culture of impunity, allowing human rights violations to proliferate, especially by state organs such as the police and judiciary.

Amnesty International has called on all states to commit themselves to end enforced disappearances, following news that a landmark treaty aimed at preventing the practice will come into effect. The International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance (Disappearances Convention) will enter into force on 23 December, after Iraq on Wednesday became the 20th country to ratify it. The Convention aims to establish the truth about enforced disappearances, punish perpetrators and provide reparations to victims and their families.

The former ruling ZANU PF party has withdrawn its support for changes to the Public Order and Security Amendments Act (POSA). POSA is a piece of legislation tightened up by a ZANU PF dominated parliament in 2002. The draconian legislation gives untold powers to the police, who apparently opposed changes to the Act. The Ministry of Home Affairs and the police are responsible for the administration of the Act.

Wikileaks founder Julian Assange, who sometimes resides in Kenya and Tanzania, has severely embarrassed the Obama Administration throughout the past week with the leaking of US diplomatic cables. Worse is, by all accounts, yet to come. The leaked files include material from the 2007 Kenyan election and its violent aftermath. They are much-awaited in some quarters of the Kenyan political sector, especially with regard to the ongoing build-up to the cases at The Hague by International Criminal Court chief prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo. There are even those who are hoping that something might crop up in the Kenya cables which could play game changer to the whole ICC process as it stands at present.

The camp of Ivorian presidential challenger Alassane Ouattara vowed on Friday to reject any legal move to overturn provisional poll results giving him victory, warning of a possible return to civil war. The world's top cocoa grower was plunged into uncertainty last Thursday after the constitutional council, whose chief is close to President Laurent Gbagbo, said it did not recognise provisional results and would rule on the outcome within days.