A High Court hearing beginning tomorrow, 6 December, could decide the fate of the Chagos islanders, the community removed from their homeland by British authorities so the United States could build a military base. The islanders, some of whom have travelled from Mauritius, will be organising a demonstration outside the Royal Courts of Justice to highlight their case. The islanders are challenging the British government's declaration last year that they had no right to live in their island homeland. The initial removal from their homes was declared unlawful in a landmark High Court victory in 2000, leading the government to promise they could return to at least some of the islands. However the government stalled on even allowing visits, and in 2004, using a power described as a little-used colonial relic, it declared the islanders had no right to live in their homeland.

So far, Kenya has been lucky. It has been nearly two years since the bird flu outbreak emerged and more than eight months since the illness spread from its birthplace in Asia. Yet with more than 300 cases in at least eight countries to date, a disease that has rocked Asian markets, ruined the tourist trade of an entire region and spread panic through some of the world's largest countries has largely passed by.

Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, who will be Africa’s first female president when she takes office in Liberia next month, on Monday (December 5) promised no rapist would go unpunished during her tenure. New legislation making rape illegal for the first time in Liberia was passed by parliament amid a flurry of rape cases and accusations that have flooded the local media. “Nobody will abuse our girls and women and get away with it; any law on rape especially the rape bill just passed into law will be totally implemented under our government,” Sirleaf said in a live radio interview.

"You will receive no visitors and you will rot here until you sign this paper." The reported words of an Eritrean military commander to Helen Berhane, a well known gospel singer of the Rema Church who has been detained incommunicado in Mai Serwa military camp since 13 May 2004. She is currently held in a metal shipping container. Helen Berhane is just one of many people in Eritrea who are locked up because they do not belong to an officially recognised faith. In the last 3 years, at least 26 pastors and priests, some 1750 evangelical church members, and dozens of Muslims have been detained by the government.

Uganda has increasingly come in the spotlight at the Commonwealth Heads of Governments Meeting (CHOGM) in Malta as activist groups lobby for "stringent" action against the country following the arrest of opposition leader Kizza Besigye. Human rights and other civil society organisations have also threatened to demonstrate when President Yoweri Museveni arrives in Malta. The development puts in jeorpardy Uganda's bid to host the 2007 CHOGM.

This resource is designed to help women peace builders and practitioners to effectively promote peace and security. Initiative for Inclusive Security and International Alert collaborated to produce this toolkit, which outlines the components of peace building from conflict prevention to post-conflict reconstruction and highlights the role that women play in each phase.

The Kenya Human Rights Commission (KHRC) is exceedingly anxious that national debate on the post-referendum period has thus far focussed on the possible transformations that may take place on the political scene following the adoption or rejection of the proposed new constitution. As a consequence, there has been nominal concern about the status of human rights protection and the rule of law in the aftermath of the referendum.

In a report published today(December 6), a week before the World Trade Organisation ministerial opens in Hong Kong, the international development agency ActionAid warns that developing countries will be trapped in poverty if they are denied the right to protect their economies against international competition. The report 'TRADE INVADERS: the WTO and Developing Countries' Right to Protect' looks at the downside of free trade policies and economic liberalisation. ActionAid's case studies - from Brazil, the Gambia, India, Nigeria, Pakistan and South Africa - describe how, time after time, farmers have been ruined and factories closed down as cheap goods from abroad flooded in after trade barriers were lifted.

Mohammad is from war-torn Darfur, often described as the scene of some of the worst violence in the world over the past two years. Enough for an asylum claim by someone from Darfur to be taken seriously, one would think. At the end of May 2005 this year, after considerable lobbying and court appeals by the Greek Council for Refugees and Amnesty International, Mohammad was released from his third spell of detention in Greece. Yet he is still no closer to having his claim to be a refugee properly examined, let alone be recognized as one.

Africa's strategic importance to the United States - both with respect to Washington's "war on terrorism" and the growing competition with China for access to energy supplies and other raw materials - should be given more attention by policy-makers and the public, according to a major new report by the influential Council on Foreign Relations (CFR). The 139-page report, which charges the administration of U.S. President George W. Bush with lacking a comprehensive, long-term strategy for dealing with the region, calls on Washington to upgrade its diplomatic and intelligence capabilities in the region by appointing an ambassador to the African Union (AU) and opening more missions in key African cities, particularly in energy-producing countries.

The arrival of December in Cuba, as well as signalling the end of the hurricane season and the scorching temperatures of summer, is also a time for remembering one of the most dramatic periods in recent Cuban history: the country's 13-year-long participation in the war in Angola. Between 1975 and 1988, some 350,000 Cubans took part in the civil war in the southern African nation, which was also the last time Cuba's military forces were involved in an armed conflict. According to Cuban government figures, during all of the "internationalist" missions carried out in Africa from the early 1960s to the withdrawal of the last soldier from Angola on May 25, 1991, a total of 2,077 Cubans were killed.

The international humanitarian aid organisation Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) says that the army in northern Katanga Province of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) has blocked relief workers from entering the area since beginning a military campaign against local militias there in mid-November. "We think there are many people who need assistance," the coordinator of MSF's Emergency Team in the DRC, Laurence Sailly, told IRIN on Monday from Kinshasa. However, MSF said as it could not get close to the front line it could not give a reliable estimate of the scale of the problem.

As South Sudanese refugees start to go back to their homeland after more than two decades of exile, a group of refugees from the Democratic Republic of the Congo, DRC, is getting ready to leave South Sudan to return to their home country after 40 years in exile.

Tens of thousands of refugees in the Great Lakes region have started returning home, but without adequate support they could reignite conflicts and end up joining the millions of people displaced within their own countries, said Dennis McNamara, director of the UN Inter-Agency Internal Displacement Division. He said there were currently only three million refugees in all of Africa - but over 11 million IDPs in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Uganda and Sudan.

Panic gripped Nairobi on Monday afternoon as the waves of a massive earthquake on Lake Tanganyika shook buildings in Kenya, some 975 kilometres away, sending workers scampering to safety. The earthquake, measuring 6.8 on the Richter scale, was reported to have toppled dozens of homes and killed several people on the Congo-Tanzania border. By Monday evening, the number of casualties was yet to be established.

Nigeria's ruling People's Democratic Party has ended a key meeting without ruling on the issue which is threatening to split the party - and the nation apart. The row between President Olusegun Obasanjo and Vice-President Atiku Abubakar is over the question of whether to change the constitution to let Mr Obasanjo stand for a third term. Analysts say Mr Obasanjo is positively disposed to serving a third term in order to consolidate the economic reforms which he is pursuing and to continue his fight against corruption. He is said not to trust Mr Atiku or any potential successors to continue these policies.

The Democratic Republic of the Congo is preparing for a referendum on an new constitution on December 18, part of a long peace process scheduled to lead to an elected government by June of next year. Nevertheless, the transition to peace and stability in the country is precarious. According to the International Crisis Group, "Reunification has been plagued by government corruption and mismanagement, failure to reform the security sector, the ongoing threat of the Rwandan Hutu insurgency FDLR based in the eastern Congo, and a weak UN peacekeeping mission (MONUC) that is not
adequately protecting civilians."

Forced Migration Review's special issue on "Sudan: prospects of peace" is launched on 30th November with launches in London, Khartoum and Juba. "Sudan: prospects for peace" offers a wide range of opinion on the inclusiveness of the peace process, the Comprehensive Peace Agreement's prospects for success, feasibility of plans to assist the return of IDPs and refugees and recovery and development strategies. Many of the 38 authors regret the inability to negotiate peace in Darfur, the ongoing crisis in Eastern Sudan, exclusion of women from the peace process and the significant delays in merging the northern and southern armies and delivering funding pledged by the international community in Oslo in April.

Hon. Wangari Maathai blazed the trail for African and Kenyan women in regard to international recognition for peace activism. Betty Kaari Murungi has now followed in those footsteps. On November 11th 2005, in New York, Betty received the annual International Advocate for Peace Award which honours individuals who embody passion through their work in international conflict resolution. This award was founded by the Cardozo Journal of Conflict Resolution which draws its name from former U.S. Supreme Court Justice, Benjamin N. Cardozo, who was renowned for his integrity and social consciousness.

Refugees are people, and people are prone to catch HIV from each other – and then pass it on to others – unless they have some understanding of the disease and take the necessary precautions to prevent it spreading. However, traditional structures for dealing with refugees – from the camp management level up to the host and donor government policy-making levels – have tended to ignore the obvious: when it comes to HIV/AIDS, refugees should not be treated in isolation from the surrounding population. The UN refugee agency has been working closely with UNAIDS – of which it became a co-sponsor in June 2004 – to address these issues. Marking this year's World AIDS Day on, December 1, a jointly produced publication that is part of the UNAIDS 'Best Practice Collection' will be officially launched.